ZAGREB, April 4, 2018 – Bosnia and Herzegovina is one of the countries of strategic importance to Croatia and that is why relations with it need to be intensified, Croatian Foreign and European Affairs Minister Marija Pejčinović Burić said at the start of her two-day official visit to Sarajevo on Wednesday.
Pejčinović Burić met with her counterpart Igor Crnadak and later attended the opening of the office of the Croatian Chamber of Commerce (HGK) at the Croatian Embassy. This is part of the strategy to combine the capacities which Croatia has abroad to strengthen its political and economic ties with important countries, Pejčinović Burić told a press conference.
“The government wants to respond to the challenges of the time in the best way possible,” she said, adding that a similar model combining classic and economic diplomacy was used by Austria and Germany. Such offices should ensure better management of the existing resources and provide full service required by businesses.
Pejčinović Burić said that stronger economic ties between Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina would lead to an improvement of overall relations between the two countries. She said that Croatia had a duty to look after the Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina and contribute to stability in the country and the status of the Croats in it.
She announced that the HGK would open its office at the Croatian Consulate General in Mostar next week.
HGK president Luka Burilović said that, after Brussels, Moscow and Shanghai, the HGK would open its office in Sarajevo. “We have chosen Sarajevo because Bosnia is a natural foreign trade partner to us and always among top five most important countries,” Burilović said.
Croatia-Bosnia trade in 2017 reached nearly 2.2 billion euro, with Croatia’s exports to Bosnia amounting to more than 1.5 billion euro.
Pejčinović Burić will be staying in Sarajevo on Thursday as well. She is scheduled to hold separate talks with High Representative Valentin Inzko, Croat member of the Bosnian collective presidency Dragan Ćović and the Sarajevo Archbishop, Cardinal Vinko Puljić.
