Politics

ZAGREB, August 25, 2019 - A 42-year-old man, who was arrested in Saturday on charges of threats and infliction of bodily harm to a 70-year-old man in Rijeka based on the victim's ethnic background, will be detained in investigative custody for 30 days, the Rijeka police stated on Sunday. The suspect, who is a public employee in the civil protection administration, has been also suspended from his job. The 42-year-old man was arrested at the Rupe border crossing on Saturday morning on suspicion that he committed a criminal offence of threat in an incident in a car park in Rijeka's…

ZAGREB, August 25, 2019 - Croatia's Foreign and European Affairs Ministry says that the statement by Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić that the armed rebellion of local Serbs against Croatia's authorities in the early 1990s aimed at undermining the Constitutional and legal order was justified is absolutely unacceptable. The ministry calls on Serbia to abandon the rhetoric that is detrimental to the bilateral relations as well as to stop manipulating the facts and start enhancing the status of the ethnic Croat minority. Ministry warns about Serbia's attempts to downplay its responsibility for aggression against Croatia "The Republic of Croatia refutes any…

ZAGREB, August 25, 2019 - A Croatian member of the European Parliament, Ruža Tomašić, as well as a presidential candidate, Miroslav Škoro, on Saturday criticised the Croatian Serb leader Milorad Pupovac of "adding fuel to the flames" following the incidents in two cafes near Knin. Following Pupovac's statements that the situation in Croatia's society resembled the times in the aftermath of Croatia's war of independence and that he would inform international institutions of the violations of minority rights, MEP Ruža Tomašić says on her Facebook profile that every violence should be condemned and perpetrators should be brought to justice, however,…

ZAGREB, August 25, 2019 - Croatian Interior Minister Davor Božinović said on Saturday that a joint European solution was the best response to the issue of illegal migrants, after Slovenia decided to continue putting up fencing along its border with Croatia. Asked by the press about Slovenia's decision on setting up an additional 4-kilometre fence in a bid to counter a rise in illegal border crossings, Božinović said that obviously countries differently responded to the influx of irregular migrants, and the best way would be to act jointly in compliance with the European solution. Božinović said that Croatia's well-trained and…

ZAGREB, August 24, 2019 - The Croatian police are conducting extensive investigations into the 21 August incidents in cafes in the village of Đevrske and in the village of Uzdolje near Knin, and considering the Đevirske case, misdemeanour charges have been filed against five people and one person is charged with a criminal offence, Interior Minister Davor Božinović said on Saturday, expressing hope that the Uzdolje investigation will also result in the detection of the perpetrators. The police are investigating the incidents which happened this past Wednesday when guests, including a 9-year-boy, and the owner of Uzdolje cafe were beaten,…

ZAGREB, August 24, 2019 - Commenting on recent attacks on members of the Serb minority, the president of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Davor Bernardić, said on Friday that these attacks were not isolated cases, adding that once the SDP returned to power, these attacks and violence would not be tolerated. Asked to comment on SDP's position on recent attacks on members of the Serb ethnic minority, the SDP chief said these attacks "are not isolated cases." "Unfortunately, this was only one (of a number of) attacks on Serbs in Croatia during the rule of the incumbent government, but this…

ZAGREB, August 23, 2019 - Prime Minister Andrej Plenković on Friday reiterated his condemnation of the Knin incidents and called on the relevant agencies to spare no effort to identify and sanction the perpetrators. Plenković said that the assaults against ethnic Serbs in the two villages near Knin were evidently premeditated and all should be done to detect and sanction the perpetrators. Plenković also insisted that he and his cabinet had clearly and promptly condemned all the incidents against ethnic Serbs. The premier recalled that the ruling majority in the parliament included representatives of ethnic minorities, including the Independent Democratic…

ZAGREB, August 23, 2019 - Presidential candidate Miroslav Škoro said on Friday that the Croatian society was already deeply divided and therefore it would not be good for it to be divided when it came to the topic of victims. On the occasion of European Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism and Nazism, which is in Croatia observed in memory of the victims of all totalitarian and authoritarian regimes, Škoro attended the Requiem mass and funeral of 294 people killed in the aftermath of WWII, whose remains were unearthed in the recent years in Zagreb's suburb of Gračani. Škoro…

ZAGREB, August 23, 2019 - On the occasion of European Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism and Nazism, Prime Minister Andrej Plenković on Friday paid his respects at Zagreb's Mirogoj cemetery to all the victims on non-democratic regimes in the 20th century. Plenković who was accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Davor Božinović, Veterans' Affairs Minister Tomo Medved and special adviser of social issues, Academic Zvonko Kusić, lit candles at the grave of late president Franjo Tuđman, at the grave for national heroes and at the memorial to the victims at Bleiburg, the government's public relations…

ZAGREB, August 23, 2019 - Šibenik-Knin police have arrested a 28 and 25 year old who insulted the owner and guests in a cafe in Knin on Wednesday evening based on ethnicity while an investigation into an incident that occurred in another cafe near Knin that evening in which the owner of the cafe and several guests were injured, is still continuing. The police on Friday reported that the two suspects have been indicted for disturbing the peace and order. An investigation into the incident determined that the two entered the cafe under the influence of alcohol and then insulted…