CRO & BH FEDERAL OFFICIALS VISIT BRIDGE CONSTRUCTION SITE OVER SAVA

( Editorial: --> 8327 ) ZUPANJA/ORASJE, July 17 (Hina) - High Croatian and Bosnian officials on Friday visited the construction site of a bridge across the Sava river between Croatia and Bosnia destroyed in the war. The Croatian President's special envoy for relations with the Croat-Muslim Bosnian Federation and Bosnia-Herzegovina Franjo Greguric and Bosnia's Ambassador to Croatia Hasan Muratovic pointed out to the interest both countries have in completing the bridge connecting Zupanja in Croatia and Orasje in the Bosnian Federation as soon as possible. Talking to contractor "Djuro Djakovic" from Slavonski Brod, Croatia, and a transport equipment factory from Tuzla, BH, Greguric and Muratovic recalled the economic and overall importance of the first bridge that will connect Croatia and the Federation after the war. The deadline for opening the bridge is this year's end, but we will request that the bridge be completed earlier, Greguric told reporters on the bridge. Three-hundred-and-four metres of the 900m-long steel road bridge was destroyed. The two ends of the bridge across the middle of the Sava river will be connected on October 5. The reconstruction, financed by the World Bank, costs US$6.5 million. Half the loan is paid by Bosnia, while Croatia pays 80 per cent of the other half, with the remaining 20 per cent paid by Croatian Roads. Asked whether the Bosnian Serb entity was participating in paying out the loan, Ambassador Muratovic answered in the negative. Greguric and Muratovic were dissatisfied with the fact that BH and Croatia were preparing the building of customs and accompanying buildings separately. This is expensive and it would be better for the customs services to be joined, they said, adding it was not late to do so. Asked about the traffic system on the bridge between Gunja, Croatia, and Brcko, Bosnian Serb entity, which was opened last year, Muratovic said the route was not in regular commercial use. Bosnian Serb border services are causing difficulties, he added. (hina) ha jn 171651 MET jul 98