“It’s a difficult situation when I have to say that I’m also the president of Croats not living in Croatia, who have the right to vote because they are Croatian citizens. And not just Croats. There are Bosniaks and Serbs in BiH who also have Croatian citizenship. Perhaps they vote, perhaps they don’t. When Croats are able to elect their representative in Sarajevo on their own, equally as the other two constituent peoples, then those words of mine will be completely or somewhat superfluous,” Milanović told the press in Varaždin.
He was responding to BiH Presidency Chairman Željko Komšić, who said on Thursday that by saying that he was also the president of all Croatian citizens in BiH while Komšić was not, Milanović had surpassed even Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić.
“If you want to chase Croats out of BiH or alienate them from BiH, then you’ll deprive them of those fundamental constitutional rights, while simultaneously accusing those who only fight for basic house rules of being destroyers and comparing them with warmongers,” Milanović said, adding that “the more Croats insist on that right, the more, more than before, they care about staying there.”
Insults from Serbia
Responding to Serbian Interior Minister Aleksandar Vulin’s statement earlier this week that Milanović was “one of the stupider Croatian politicians,” Milanović said he did not have “my own loudmouths and rabble-rousers who will roundly insult Vučić.”
“I’ll say some things that are not pleasant in my own words, from my own mouth,” he said, wondering “what would happen if I was the smartest” politician in Croatia.
Milanović added that while he did say earlier this week that Vučić was proud of having been a warmonger in the 1990s, he did not call anyone a Chetnik. “I draw the line at such things.”
No difference between Scholtz and Laschet
Commenting on Sunday’s German election for Chancellor Angela Merkel’s successor, he said “nothing will change,” whether it was Social Democrat Olaf Scholz or Christian Democrat Armin Laschet.
“It will be the same policy, the same course. More or less the same people will probably stay in foreign affairs as well,” he said, adding that “it almost makes no difference, both for Croatia and Europe,” who the new German chancellor is.
“They are moderate people… One should expect the continuity of the German policy. The big parties have weakened. A two-party coalition is hardly possible,” he said.
No communication on ambassadorial appointments for weeks
Commenting on relations between his office and the government concerning the appointment of ambassadors, Milanović said Foreign Minister Gordan Grlić Radman had begun talks with the head of his office but they stopped.
“Evidently at the same time as the finale of this story with the appointment of the Supreme Court president… Whether there is a causal connection, whether one has been made conditional on the other, I can’t claim that.”
He said there had been no communication on the appointment of ambassadors, consuls general and consuls for weeks. “Not because of my side. The head of my office is ready to resume those talks today… That’s not my decision, but I’m sure it’s not Minister Grlić Radman’s decision either.”
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