Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor on Tuesday received support from all political groups in the European Parliament for the completion of accession negotiations as soon as possible and encouragement to press on with the remaining reforms.
Kosor met with European Parliament President Jerzy Buzek, Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fuele and leaders of political groups in the European Parliament. The European Parliament is due to discuss and vote on a resolution on Croatia's progress on Wednesday.
"I have had a very useful and constructive meeting with Prime Minister Kosor. We have discussed the importance of maintaining the momentum of the accession negotiations and of tackling the remaining outstanding issues so that the EU accession process can be concluded," Fuele said in a statement issued after the talks.
"I emphasised on my side that Croatia needs to focus in particular on fulfilling all the closing benchmarks of chapter 23 - Judiciary and Fundamental Rights. I thanked the Prime Minister for the information that Croatia has provided on the progress achieved so far on each of the benchmarks. We will carefully take into account this information, in view of our upcoming interim report on this chapter due by the middle of March," Fuele said.
The European Commission has announced that it will submit to the member states on March 11 an interim report on the fulfilment of the benchmarks in Chapter 23 based on which it will decide on whether the chapter will be closed or not.
We hope the European Commission's report will be positive and that it will be a positive signal and a recognition of the efforts that have been made so far by Croatia and its citizens, said Joseph Daul, chairman of the largest political group in the European Parliament -- the European People's Party (EPP).
Daul expressed hope that Croatia would become a full member of the EU as soon as possible.
Martin Schulz, chairman of the Socialist group, the second strongest political group in the European Parliament, also said that Croatia had made great progress and that therefore he expected things to go smoothly in June.
I think Croatia has made great progress lately. There have been major changes in the country, Schulz said, citing the border agreement between Croatia and Slovenia as an example of how the European impact could be successful.
The chairman of the Greens group, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, said his group also supported Croatia. He said that he and Kosor had discussed war crimes prosecution and Amnesty International's latest report on that issue.
Prime Minister Kosor has pledged today that Croatia will respond to that as well, Cohn-Bendit said.
The EPP Group Bureau is to meet in Zagreb on March 3-4 to discuss, among other topics, the Judiciary and Fundamental Rights chapter, Daul announced.
The meeting will be held a few days before the European Commission submits an interim report on the Judiciary and Fundamental Rights chapter. Also attending will be Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding.
The meeting will also focus on the economic benefits of EU membership and the implications of Croatia's accession for future EU enlargement towards southeastern Europe.
