President Zoran Milanović this past Thursday described as “plain charlatanism” Prime Minister Andrej Plenković’s visit to Ukraine amid high tensions with Russia, saying that Plenković would “flee to Brussels if things get rough” and that “Croatian soldiers won’t go there (on the border with Ukraine)”.
“If more than 100,000 troops were on the border with Croatia, President Milanović would call the Ukrainian Prime Minister’s visit to Zagreb not ‘charlatanism’ but a manifestation of solidarity and friendship,” Ukrainian President Zelensky said on Twitter in a comment on Milanović’s statement.
Speaking to reporters on Friday, after his statements about Ukraine elicited criticism, Milanović again commented on Plenković’s visit to Ukraine, saying that he both sympathised and empathised with Ukraine but that one should be careful in relations with Russia and Ukraine.
“Don’t stick your nose where it does not belong. It’s very cold there and your nose might freeze,” he said.
Plenković offered Croatia’s experience of peaceful reintegration for Ukraine to use to regain control of the eastern parts of its territory also during an earlier visit to that country, an act that drew criticism from Moscow.
Earlier this week, he signed with Zelensky a joint declaration on Ukraine’s European prospects, yet another element in Zagreb’s support to a country under constant Russian pressure, making Croatia the sixth country to do so, after Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland and Slovakia.
