OSIJEK: MESIC, KLEIN COMMENT ON RETURN, ECONOMIC RECOVERY

OSIJEK, June 22 (Hina) - Croatian President Stipe Mesic on Thursday assessed the return of Croatian citizens of Serb nationality could help in the democratisation of Serbia. Addressing reporters after the first part of today's meeting 'Osijek in the New Century' in Osijek, Mesic said Croatia's former political leadership had not genuinely supported returns to the Croatian Danube region and the region's economic recovery, whereas the current authorities were interested in the return of all citizens who were war victims and the prosecution of war criminals. "The return of Serbs, our citizens, can have an effect on the democratisation of Serbia. Croatia cannot build walls around itself, and the wrong policy of the old regime was burdened with the feeling of being threatened by an external enemy. We are opening up to Europe and the world and we must renew and activate our resources and build a state in which all citizens will be equal under the law. Our neighbourhood must be democratic and therefore we are interested in Serbia's democratisation and Milosevic's departure, which was what the former regime did not want," Mesic said. U.N. Secretary-General's special envoy and a former transitional administrator for the Danube region, Jacques Paul Klein, said his efforts to stimulate investments in eastern Slavonia had been undermined by the former Croatian government. According to Klein, the former government believed that, if money and investments were brought into the region and the region was stabilised and new jobs created, more Serbs would want to stay, and the government's intention was for the Serbs to leave. Klein expressed hope that people would realise that the former state leadership was to blame for economic problems, which could have been avoided. (hina) jn rml