Croatia News - CroatiaPress.com

Zagreb, February 6 (CP) – The EU expansion commissioner Olli Rehn has informed the European Commission of the course of accession negotiations with Croatia and told reporters that there would be no postponement or blocking of talks due to the issue of the Protected Ecology and Fisheries Belt (ZERP).

The European Commission has expressed readiness to help in finding a political solution, but no details have been put forth.

Croatia has implemented the Protected Ecology and Fisheries Belt  in the Adriatic on January 1, 2008 sparking reaction from neighbouring EU countries, Slovenia and Italy, who claim Croatia had signed in 2004 a document stating it would not implement the Zone against EU countries.

Zagreb, February 6 (CP) — A freight ship sailing under a Turkish flag has caught fire in the Northern Adriatic not far from the resort of Rovinj where Croatian territorial waters are meeting the Protected Zone.

A mayday call was received this morning by the maritime search and rescue centre.

All the crew members and passengers, a total of 31, have been rescued.

Although a water bomber is attempting to put out the fire, it has so far been unsuccessful.

There are fears that the ship will sink and cause an environmental disaster, as there are some 11 tonnes of different oil products onboard.
 

Zagreb, February 6 (CP) — The Slovene Foreign Ministry has sent a non-paper through diplomatic channels responding to claims made in a Croatian non-paper regarding the Protected Ecology and Fisheries Zone in the Adriatic.

The Slovene document notes Croatia’s obligation to respect an alleged agreement regarding non-implementation of the zone for EU member-states dating from 2004.

Responding to a statement by Croatian Prime Minister Ivo Sanader who claimed that one member of the EU has been blocking Croatian accession negotiations since 2006, Slovene Prime Minister Janez Janša said that his country had reservations regarding the beginning of negotiations for the chapter on fishing.

Zagreb, February 6 (CP) — Members of consumer’s associations have called for a one week shopping boycott in the country so that citizens may demonstrate their dissatisfaction with prices and the treatment of consumers.

Consumers have been called upon to show their strength and only purchase products that are absolutely necessary for a week, starting Thursday.

Associations claim that recent price decreases for milk, bread and oil are only an attempt to alleviate the shock to citizens’ standard of living, adding that price increases for electricity are yet to come.

Zagreb, February 6 (CP) — Members of the European Parliament’s Foreign Policy Committee are visiting Zagreb, headed by Croatia rapporteur, Austrian Socialist Hannes Swoboda.

They will be meeting with top state officials to discuss Croatia’s accession to the EU and the implementation of the Protected Ecology and Fisheries Zone in the Adriatic, which EU member-states Italy and Slovenia are strongly opposed to.

Zagreb, February 6 (CP) – The coastal town of Split and its Poljud stadium are to host Wednesday evening’s friendly between the Croatian and Dutch soccer squads.

The Croatian squad has drawn six and lost two matches in Split since Croatia’s gaining independence in 1991 playing in Split.

It is hoping to end the string of winless matches taking advantage of the two Netherlands strikers Ruud van Nistelrooy and Robin van Persie and winger Arjen Robben not appearing due to injury.

Both teams are EURO finalists with Croatia having the advantage of all of its team appearing in the game tonight.

The kick-off is at 8:30 p.m., local.

Zagreb, February 6 (CP) – Croatian high jumper Blanka Vlasic has continued her winning steak with clearing 204 centimetres at the Banska Bystrica athletic meet in Slovakia on Wednesday, setting her personal season record.

She left behind her greatest rival Russian Yekaterina Savchenko, who managed only 197 centimetres.

This is the third win for Vlasic in as many meets this season and she is to appear next at the IAAF meet in Karlsruhe on Sunday and three days later at the athletic meet held in her hometown of Split.

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.

Zagreb, February 5 (CP) — The most renowned European fire expert Domingos Xavier Viegas is visiting Sibenik in a bid to together with several other experts try to find out how the 12 fire-fighters died in August 2007 in Kornat, after they were called up to put out a fire on the island.

He had already conducted a simulation of the Kornat fire at his laboratory in Portugal and concluded that an eruptive fire is most probably the reason for the fire fighters not being able to survive.

Some 12 firefighters from the mainland died when fire closed in on them and experts are still baffled at why the tragedy happened, so world experts are being called in to help in the effort.

Zagreb, February 5 (CP) – A Promocija Plus polling agency survey conducted in January has shown that some 71.6 percent of Croats want to see a NATO referendum staged.

The 1,300 surveyed have said that they would rather have a referendum, than the decision on whether Croatia should become a NATO member being made solely by parliament, the latter being supported by just 24.7 percent of those polled.

It is interesting, however, that the support of Croats for NATO membership is growing at the same time, with January seeing 51.1 percent of the surveyed in favour of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation membership, improving membership popularity by three percent compared to the previous month.

Although the efforts of the government to explain the benefits of NATO membership to the population seem to be yielding results, it is evident that those same enlightened people want to make their own decision and not be pushed into anything, which is one of the key elements of democracy that the Croatian government is claiming to be striving for.

However, the government has recently said there would be no referendum on this, as more than 50 percent of the population was supporting NATO membership.

This was also stated by the government spokesperson Zlatko Mehun, who said that no referendum on the issue was being planned, especially not two months before a membership invitation is expected to be extended. He said a quality debate in parliament would be enough.