Croatian President Ivo Josipovic and his Serbian counterpart Boris Tadic will hold a working meeting in the Croatian northern seaside resort of Opatija on Wednesday afternoon in a bid to resume talks at the top level and defuse the tensions in bilateral relations.
The relations between Croatia and Serbia have deteriorated since Croatia's recognition of the independence of Kosovo and the nonattendance of Serbian head of state Tadic at Josipovic's inauguration in Zagreb last month capped this deterioration.
According to sources form the Office of the Croatian President, holding talks in Opatija has been proposed by both countries and both Josipovic and Tadic want this meeting to sort out problems stemming from the disintegration of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia such as border disputes, refugees and treatment of national minorities. The two heads of state are expected to discuss cross-border crime and regional cooperation. Kosovo very likely will not be on the agenda.
The Josipovic-Tadic meeting is scheduled for 1:00 p.m. and they will address the press two hours later.
Opatija was chosen as the venue of the meeting to give a more informal feeling to the event.
According to the same sources, Josipovic wants to resume the dialogue with Serbia and keep it going and Tadic is coming to Opatija to show his readiness to dialogue.
Josipovic and Tadic will presumably attend an international conference in Brussels later this week and they wanted to hold a bilateral meeting before their possible talks on the margins of an international event.
The news about plans for their meeting in Opatija was welcomed by the European Union and its member-states. Brussels has not exerted any influence or facilitated the organisation of the Opatija talks, the source from Josipovic's Office said.
The bilateral meeting was organised with co-ordination of the Croatian government and Foreign Ministry State Secretary Davor Bozinovic is due to join Josipovic and Tadic in Opatija.
