Prime Minister Plenković called on Slovenia to stop with the blackmailing.
Prime Minister Andrej Plenković on Thursday urged Slovenia to end its blackmail policies, the day after Ljubljana announced that it would not support Croatia’s membership in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), reports Novi List on September 7, 2017.
On Wednesday, Slovenian Foreign Minister Karl Erjavec said that Slovenia would block Croatia’s membership in the OECD because Croatia “does not respect international law, arbitration agreement and arbitration tribunal’s decisions.” He was referring to the controversy regarding the border dispute arbitration, whose decision Slovenia wants to implement, while Croatia claims that the decision is not binding since Slovenia compromised the arbitration process.
At a government’s session on Thursday, Plenković said that Slovenia should stop with the blackmailing. “I call on Slovenia to support Croatia as an EU member to be an OECD member as well. They should abandon the policy of blackmail because such policies lead to nowhere,” he said.
Plenković also reiterated that the Croatian position on the border dispute was clear. “This is an open question, and Croatia is ready to discuss it bilaterally,” said Plenković, adding that a visit to Slovenia’s Prime Minister Miro Cerar to Croatia was being prepared.
Plenković added said he was satisfied with his two recent visits to neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina and commented on the opposition of some Bosniak politicians to the construction of the Pelješac Bridge.
“Our message is quite clear: a dialogue with Bosnia and Herzegovina, clarification of all aspects, international, legal, technical. We are ready and open to discussion,” said Plenković, pointing out that the Pelješac Bridge, built on the Croatian territory, is a strategic project which will connect not just the territory of Croatia, but also of the European Union. It will also ease traffic jams which occur every summer in Neum, the only Bosnian town on the Adriatic coast, which the Pelješac Bridge is designed to bypass.
Translated from Novi List.
