Croatian President Ivo Josipovic believes that bringing Croatia's European Union membership talks to completion in June is one of the country's most important strategic goals and calls on the government to be fully committed to the implementation of the reforms rather than waste time accusing others of a possible failure to attain this goal in June, the Office of the President of the Republic said in a statement on Thursday.
The statement was issued in response to Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor's statement earlier in the day that she could hardly understand President Josipovic's assessment that the completion of the negotiations with Brussels by the end of June would not be any special achievement and she also reiterated that she and her Cabinet deemed this time frame for the completion of the negotiations to be realistic and that they were doing all they could to achieve it. Kosor also said that she disagreed with the President that the political system in the country was unstable.
"Following today's statement by Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor, President Ivo Josipovic reiterates that the completion of the negotiations in June is one of the most important strategic goals and that it is so important that it should and could have been attained a long time ago."
"The government conducts the negotiations and is responsible for the implementation of necessary reforms. In this regard, the government enjoys full support from the President of the Republic and opposition parties. Therefore the President is calling on the government not to waste time accusing others of a possible failure to bring the negotiations to completion and of a serious situation in the country, but it should be fully committed to the implementation of the reforms," Josipovic's Office said in the statement.
In response to Kosor's claim that the border arbitration agreement, reached by Kosor and Slovenian Prime Minister Borut Pahor, had greatly contributed to bringing Croatia's accession process to completion, while Josipovic, who at the time had been a parliamentary deputy of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), had voted against the deal, the statement said that President Josipovic regarded the arbitration agreement as an act passed by the national parliament and therefore he fully respects and abides by that agreement.
As an MP in the Sabor, he was against the agreement because he thought that during negotiations the Croatian government had not achieved all that was really possible to protect Croatian national interests.
