ZAGREB, 9 Oct (Hina) - Shortly before his departure for Strasbourg, where he is heading a state delegation to take part in the second summit of the Council of Europe, Croatia's President Franjo Tudjman gave a statement on Croatia's
expectations from the meeting, as well as on Croatia's position following the voluntary surrender of ten Bosnian Croats to the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague.
ZAGREB, 9 Oct (Hina) - Shortly before his departure for
Strasbourg, where he is heading a state delegation to take part
in the second summit of the Council of Europe, Croatia's
President Franjo Tudjman gave a statement on Croatia's
expectations from the meeting, as well as on Croatia's position
following the voluntary surrender of ten Bosnian Croats to the
International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in
The Hague. #L#
"First of all, this is actually the first summit of the
Council of Europe, following our admission (to the organisation),
at which I am to deliver a speech as the state leader of the
independent Croatia and at which I am to have many meetings with
European heads of countries. The importance lies in the fact
that I will present our standpoints and our situation concerning
everything that has been going on around Croatia both in
connection with the Danube river region and the crisis in Bosnia
and Herzegovina," Tudjman said.
Asked how much Croatia's position has been strengthened
after the voluntary surrender of ten Bosnian Croats to The Hague,
Tudjman said that their surrender was a sign of not only the
consistency but the strength of the Croatian international
policy.
"It is not true, and some impressions that have arisen in
the public are also wrong, that we have given in because our men
left. No, our men left after we had been given guarantees that
they would have a speedy and fair trial. Also, this is not only
in the interest of Croatia as a state, but in the interest of
those people who were persecuted, who lived in impossible
conditions, as hunted animals," Tudjman said.
One should recall that we were faced with election
engineering when the elections in Bosnia are concerned, Tudjman
said, adding that the election engineering had endangered the
survival of Croathood in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
With the determination of the Croat leadership in Bosnia-
Herzegovina and the Federation, and with my intervention which
followed later, we succeeded in changing that situation, Tudjman
said.
He stressed the importance of the fact that the United
States had changed its attitude to Bosnia-Herzegovina.
"Despite the fact that only unitary Bosnia has been
discussed lately, for the first time the most responsible people
of the United States started saying both here and in Washington
that relations there should be solved on the basis of the
Washington and Dayton agreements and - as it is known, the
Washington agreement speaks clearly about confederate relations
between the Federation and Croatia," Tudjman said.
After all that, it is clear that all reasons for isolation
and financial and economic blockade against Croatia had to be
dropped, Tudjman said.
These are all positive signs that Croatia and its
constructive policy should have been taken very seriously and
that nothing could have been extorted from Croatia only with
pressure and requests for new concessions, Tudjman said in his
statement to the press at Zagreb airport on Thursday.
"Croatia should have been given guarantees both when it
comes to the people I have mentioned before and to other issues,"
Tudjman said.
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