A draft progress report on Croatia, which was presented before the European Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday by the Rapporteur for Croatia, Austrian Socialist Hannes Swoboda, expresses hope that "the forthcoming elections will not discourage the government, with the support of the opposition, from taking necessary, albeit sometimes difficult decisions, particularly in the field of competition policy and state aid, given that those decisions will ultimately benefit all Croatian citizens."
The draft report passed first reading before the Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday and members of the Committee can propose their amendments by March 1.
The Committee is due to vote on the report on March 27, after which it will be referred as a proposed resolution to the European Parliament. Resolutions, which are unbinding documents, are put to the vote at plenary sessions of the Parliament.
Croatian Justice Minister Ana Lovrin is scheduled to address the Committee on March 20.
The report congratulated the Croatian authorities for "the rapid progress made so far in accession negotiations, particularly in the adoption of key pieces of legislation in crucial areas such as public administration, the administration of courts and anti-corruption policy."
The report urges the Croatian government "actively to encourage and support the prosecution of war crimes, regardless of the nationality of the perpetrators, (and) deplores in this respect the government's offer to support the defence costs for General Gotovina and its request to act as amicus curiae in Gotovina's and other cases pending before the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), since both those decisions send out an ambivalent message to the general public."
In his address to the Foreign Affairs Committee, Swoboda said that it had taken Croatia a long time to hand Gotovina over to the tribunal, that the Croatian public had an ambivalent attitude to this issue and that the government itself had contributed to such ambivalence.
"The government should counteract the public's perception of the ICTY as a hostile institution and publicise the role the tribunal plays in prosecuting crimes committed against Croat civilians," the report says.
Swoboda called for an "objective analysis of Croatia's recent history, true reconciliation between the different peoples and the establishment of good neighbourly relations," stressing that EU accession cannot be achieved without it.
The draft document regrets that "the provisions in the Civil Service Act introducing transparency and objectivity in the appointment and assessment of civil servants will not enter into force until after the next election."
Swoboda welcomed the Croatian government's new five-year plan to tackle the issue of former tenancy right holders and invited the justice minister to submit promptly her plan for the rationalisation of the number of courts operating in the country in order to make them more professional and efficient.
He added that the plan should go hand in hand with "a thorough overhaul of the procedures and criteria for appointing and assessing judicial staff given that the current is still not providing sufficient guarantees for a professional and independent judiciary."
On the subject of the economy, the report cited steadily increasing economic growth based on an ambitious reform agenda and on strong private investment and expressed hope that this would soon result in more jobs.
The Croatian government was reminded that "an open, competitive market economy is a fundamental requirement for EU membership" and was urged to "implement more seriously and expeditiously the agreed targets for the sale of minority and majority state-owned interests in companies and for the reduction of state subsidies, particularly those to non-viable companies."
The report concluded by urging the Croatian and Slovenian governments "to exploit all the opportunities available in order to reach an agreement on all their pending issues" and inviting them "to abstain from any unilateral decision which might undermine such an agreement."