The report is very dry in tone given everything that occurred in 2013, said Dragan Crnogorac of the Independent Democratic Serb Party (SDSS), citing the implementation of the law on the official use of the languages and scripts of national minorities, hate speech at sporting events, lack of funding for education, and provision of housing. He said that the report made no mention of the return of nationalised property.
Furio Radin, who represents the Italian minority in the Croatian Parliament, said that the situation had deteriorated in all areas, particularly with regard to the use of language and script. In this context he mentioned Vukovar, saying that the law was not being implemented there and "when it is, dual-alphabet signs are demolished in plain view of the whole world."
The head of the Government Office for Human Rights, Branko Socanec, said that activities were carried out in all areas which contributed to the exercise of minority rights safeguarded by the constitutional law and other regulations. He cited successful teaching in the languages and scripts of national minorities, an increase in the number of pupils enrolled in minority programmes and further progress in the education of the Roma minority.
However, Veljko Kajtazi, the MP representing the Roma community, warned that the figures did not reflect the reality, saying that children whose parents are employed are given priority over Roma children, whose parents are often unemployed, in enrolling in kindergarten programmes. He praised the hiring of Roma for public works and said that hiring educated Roma would encourage other Roma to pursue education.
Kajtazi said that the National Strategy for Roma should be reviewed and local action plans adopted because most problems occurred at local level.
The Committee members were not pleased with the proportion of members of minority groups in central and local government and did not share the view expressed in the report that progress had been made in ensuring the access of the national minorities to the media.
Ante Babic of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) criticised the Council for the National Minorities for financing Novosti, the weekly of the Serb minority, which he said used the worst form of hate speech in its articles on Croatia, the Croats and the Catholic Church. He said that the Serb National Council was awarded 4.1 million kuna, of which 3.5 million went to Novosti.
The Chairman of the Council for the National Minorities, Aleksandar Tolnauer, responded by saying that allegations of hate speech needed to be proved and that the Council awarded funds based on proposed programmes and not ethnicity.
Last year the government spent 138 million kuna on the implementation of the Constitutional Law.