CONSTITUTIONAL CHANGES ALMOST FULFILED MY EXPECTATIONS -- MESIC

ZAGREB, Nov 10 (Hina) - Croatian President Stipe Mesic said Friday that yesterday's adopted amendments to the Constitution had almost completely met his expectations, and added that the government authority, whose internal relations were now clearly defined, must carry out its mandate voted in elections and solve crucial economic issues. #L# "I am certainly satisfied as this was in line with almost everything a commission which I had appointed consisting of people at the highest level of experts on the Constitution had motioned," Mesic told reporters at his office, adding his suggestion on the cancelling of the Croatian Parliament's House of Counties had been dismissed. "Everything else is mostly in line with what I had envisaged," he said. Parliament's House of Representatives on Thursday evening adopted changes to the Constitution, transforming the semi-presidential into a parliamentary system of authority. "We have newly defined relations through the Constitution ... Croatia is transiting from a semi-presidential system into a parliamentary one, which is in accordance to the wishes of our citizens," Mesic said, adding the new constitutional relations now balanced relations both in the society and authority. "There is now no excuse for not solving essential issues in which all Croatian citizens are interested -- reactivating Croatia's economy, resources, human potentials, limiting the army of unemployed people and increasing export," the Croatian President asserted. "This task has been set before all of us and every one of us must perform their part of the work. This is what the public expects and we must not let they down," he said. "I now expect a peaceful, but working atmosphere in which we all must affirm ourselves," Mesic said. The adopted amendments to the Constitution have completed a task announced in the electoral campaign for the parliament, as well as in the presidential campaign, Mesic asserted. (hina) lml