Croatia News - CroatiaPress.com

Zagreb, February 5 (CP) – President Stjepan Mesic has stated that the reason for the stalling of Croatia’s EU membership negotiations was not Slovenia, but rather the fact that Croatia had not opened up enough negotiating chapters and had not closed the ones that had been opened.

He stressed that Croatia enjoyed good relations with Slovenia, apart from a few unresolved issues.

Mesic added that Croatia needed to open a debate with Slovenia on the open issues and see how relations can be brought back to the level they were at before. The president said that in order for this to happen, the two sides needed to sit together and talk, but this cannot happen if one side is ignoring calls for talks.

Slovenia had denied not wanting to hold talks, but had stated that it was waiting for the elections in Croatia to be over in order for a meeting to be agreed.

President Stjepan Mesic and his Slovene counterpart Danilo Tuerk met two days ago in a bid to encourage the two countries to resolve the unresolved issued between them, including that of the Protected Ecology and Fisheries Belt (ZERP) finding optimal solutions.