LJUBLJANA, Sept 4 (Hina) - Slovene Prime Minister Janez Drnovsek told reporters on Wednesday he was "moderately optimistic" with regard to his meeting with Croatian Prime Minister Ivica Racan, which should take place next Tuesday. He
added that a formal proposal on arbitration had not been put forward yet.
LJUBLJANA, Sept 4 (Hina) - Slovene Prime Minister Janez Drnovsek
told reporters on Wednesday he was "moderately optimistic" with
regard to his meeting with Croatian Prime Minister Ivica Racan,
which should take place next Tuesday. He added that a formal
proposal on arbitration had not been put forward yet. #L#
Drnovsek said that he had spoken to Racan on the phone on Wednesday
and that intensive talks were underway on several levels to prepare
the meeting. He stressed that the two sides had to find ways to avoid
incidents at sea and solve the case of Jozko Joras, which he said
burdened the Slovene public and the Croatian government.
Slovene PM said the letter he received today from Racan indicated
that arbitration was a probable option, which he regretted to find
out. However, he added that arbitration was still not a formal
proposal of the Croatian side.
"If Croatia puts forward a formal proposal, our government will
consider it seriously and take a stand, based on which we will
continue talks. However, Prime Minister Racan does not have the
approval of the Sabor for arbitration. Even if we were to decide on
arbitration, we would have to sign a bilateral agreement which
would have to be ratified by the parliaments, and events in Croatia
show that there are no guarantees for that," Drnovsek said.
Drnovsek repeated that the initialled border agreement was the
result of years of talks and the best possible compromise and that
possible arbitration would not change it.
Stating that the resolution of the Joras case would facilitate the
resolution of border problems, Drnovsek conveyed a somewhat
sharpened official stand of the Slovene authorities about the
"contentious" hamlets along the Dragonja River. He said that the
hamlets had been treated as contentious territory from the very
beginning and that the current Croatian border crossing Plovanija
had the status of a temporary crossing because he had protested
against its construction with the government of former Croatian
Prime Minister Nikica Valentic back in 1993.
When asked if he did not consider the claim from Racan's letter that
the initialled agreement could not be signed and ratified clear
enough, Drnovsek said, "At present Slovenia only has a platform for
bilateral talks and for the agreement I and Prime Minister Ivica
Racan initialled last year. Any other position would require a new
government stand and new negotiating positions in the
parliament".
(hina) rml sb