The European Commission is still gathering information and analysing the information it has obtained, so there is no final position yet on the bill in the Croatian parliament invalidating all legal acts of the former Yugoslav army (JNA), the former Yugoslavia, and Serbia, the Commission's deputy director-general for enlargement, Stefano Sannino, said in Brussels on Tuesday.
We are collecting all the elements and information, and after certain explanations and the letter we have received from the justice minister, we will have to examine and put them into context. At this moment, it is too soon to state our assessment, Sannino said after talks with Andrej Plenkovic, a state secretary at the Croatian Foreign Ministry.
Plenkovic informed Sannino why the Croatian government sent that bill to parliament.
"I particularly underlined that, by expanding its jurisdiction in criminal matters to Croatia's territory, Serbia has encroached upon its sovereignty. That's unacceptable to Croatia, so with this law we want to protect Croatian citizens," said Plenkovic.
He added that alongside the bill, the government was moving a declaration calling on Serbia to agree on a treaty that would solve such matters.
"With the draft declaration, we have sent the message to Serbia that we want to regulate with an international agreement all matters related to that as well as the message that our cooperation with the (Hague war crimes tribunal) is beyond question, that Croatia is determined that all those who committed crimes must be held to account but not in such a selective way, often by using evidence obtained illegally."
Plenkovic also met with the European Parliament's rapporteur on Croatia, Hannes Swoboda, also to discuss the bill in question.