OSIJEK, Dec 4 (Hina) - "Yesterday's visit of Croatian President Franjo Tudjman to the Croatian Danubian area is the most important and concrete achievement in the process of peaceful reintegration. Our President visited Vukovar and
so announced the expansion of Croatia's sovereignty to the whole of Croatia," head of the Croatian government Office of the Temporary Administration for the Establishment of Croatian Authority in Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srijem, Ivica Vrkic, told Hina on Wednesday.
OSIJEK, Dec 4 (Hina) - "Yesterday's visit of Croatian President
Franjo Tudjman to the Croatian Danubian area is the most important
and concrete achievement in the process of peaceful reintegration.
Our President visited Vukovar and so announced the expansion
of Croatia's sovereignty to the whole of Croatia," head of the
Croatian government Office of the Temporary Administration for the
Establishment of Croatian Authority in Eastern Slavonia, Baranja
and Western Srijem, Ivica Vrkic, told Hina on Wednesday. #L#
Stressing that the Transitional Administrator, General Jacques
Klein, had acted in line with his mandate, which was the
establishment of Croatian authority in the Croatian Danubian area,
Vrkic said that the arrival of President Tudjman to Vukovar had
"knocked off (the Serb representatives') last hope that they would
be able to exist as a separate political entity and autonomy on
Croatian territory".
"The President clearly reiterated yesterday that there could
be no Serb autonomy in an area where Serbs were never in majority,"
Vrkic said, adding that Serbs were being offered a possibility to
participate in the creation of conditions for introducing Croatian
authority and, after elections, the right to their representatives
in municipalities, towns, counties and the Croatian Parliament.
Vrkic announced that officials of the Temporary Administration
Office would begin performing their duties in Borovo and Beli
Manastir as of Monday, adding that as soon as conditions were
created and facilities ensured, the offices would be officially
opened.
He added that this would be the first institutional form of
introducing Croatian authority in the UNTAES-administered area.
The officials' task would be to establish better communication
with UNTAES and the local authority in the region and to continue
concrete activities in the process of peaceful reintegration, Vrkic
said.
He added that the aim of these offices entering the UNTAES-
administered area was to create preconditions for the introduction
of the rest of Croatian authority institutions, primarily the
Office for Displaced Persons, the Public Attorney's Office, as well
as registry offices and other administrative bodies which would
represent Croatian authority in the area.
"A lot of patience and wisdom is needed in this phase of the
peaceful reintegration. I think that the most important thing is
that Croatia is cooperative enough to fulfill its part of
commitments, so we do not see any reason for the Serbs not to do
the same, because there is no peaceful reintegration without active
participants, including international mediators within the
framework of UNTAES," Vrkic stressed.
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