Addressing those in attendance, Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor said that Croatia today also observed the 13th anniversary of the completion of the peaceful reintegration of its Danube River Region, saluting all residents of the eastern town of Vukovar.

Kosor highlighted the importance of all those who had defended the country, recalling the killed soldiers and the 1,015 soldiers and civilians on the list of persons detained or missing from the Homeland War. She especially thanked the parents, children and widows of killed veterans.

Kosor said that war veterans, alongside first Croatian President Franjo Tudjman, deserved the most credit for the free and sovereign Croatian state, which she added was now facing another big goal - the completion of accession negotiations with the EU.

"We are in the year in which we will celebrate the 20th anniversary of independence and in which we will be able to count, with our heads held high, all the successes from those 20 years, as a NATO member and a state about to join the European Union as its 28th full member," Kosor told the state officials and representatives of the judicial, military and local authorities as well as veterans' associations in attendance.

Kosor said that apart from working on the goal to join the EU, Croatia would continue working towards two other priority goals - economic recovery and the fight against corruption.

Croatian veterans fought for a law-based state in which everyone will have equal rights and be equal before the law, she said, calling on all institutions to respect veterans' rights in accordance with the veterans' law, as they deserved the most credit for the fact "that we have a free, democratic and European Croatia."

President Ivo Josipovic, in a letter that was read out, congratulated everyone who contributed to the building of Croatia and said that January 15, because of the international recognition of Croatia, was a date written in "golden letters" in Croatia's history, as it represented a watershed in Croatia's international and legal position.

Thanks to that, after winning the liberation war, Croatia became a constructive agent of international cooperation and peace, as a member of the UN, the Council of Europe, and NATO.

Deputy Parliament Speaker Vladimir Seks said Croatia's recognition was possible "only because it was created, because the aggressor was defeated, which means that it was created solely with the blood of the Croatian people, the Croatian veterans, and not through political games."

Before the commemoration, Mass was celebrated at which military bishop Juraj Jezerinac said that today Croatia "bleeds with all sorts of scandals" and called on the government, parliament, institutions and all citizens to build with their integrity and personal and public responsibility a better homeland, a law-based country of freedom, human dignity and peace for all its citizens.

On the occasion of the recognition anniversary, an exhibition on the Homeland War was opened, a documentary on the war and Croatia's international recognition was shown, and 32 veterans' cooperatives from Karlovac County showed their products and services.

Kosor would not comment on today's veterans' protests, saying through government spokesman Mladen Pavic that everything she had to tell the veterans she said at the commemoration.