ZORIC: CROATIA CANNOT PROGRESS IF ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD IS UNSTABLE

MOSTAR, Sept 8 (Hina) - Croatia's Ambassador to Bosnia- Herzegovina, Damir Zoric, on Wednesday visited Mostar (southern Bosnia-Herzegovina), where he held talks with Mostar Mayor Ivan Prskalo on the situation in the town. After the meeting, Zoric told reporters the talks tackled cooperation between the Croatian Embassy and the Mostar municipal leadership and the need to improve it with the aim of "improving relations" in Mostar. Prskalo said Zoric had also invited his deputy Safet Orucevic to the meeting, but Orucevic failed to appear. "An atmosphere of tension between Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina is being created again", Prskalo said, adding it was therefore understandable for Zoric to meet Mostar mayor and his deputy. Asked whether relations between Bosnia and Croatia should have been frozen after a recent statement by a co-chairman of the BH Council of Ministers, Haris Silajdzic, who accused the Croatian state leadership of the Croat-Muslim war in Bosnia, Zoric answered negatively, adding, "there are no such ideas, and even less interest on Croatia's part in something like that". Zoric added Croatia could not progress if its neighbourhood was unstable and if there was no cooperation among neighbouring countries. (hina) rml