ZAGREB, 21 June 2022 - It is unfair and incorrect to set conditions for Sweden and Finland's NATO membership, Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Tuesday after a meeting with his Finnish counterpart Sanna Marin, expressing the government's support for Finland and Sweden's NATO membership bid.
"The position of the Croatian government and parliamentary majority has been continually clear and firm - we support Finland's ambition and believe that, if that is what our EU partner wants, its choice should be respected and supported," Plenković said at a news conference he held with the visiting Finnish PM.
"We believe that at this moment NATO membership is the security umbrella both Finland and Sweden want," he added.
The prime minister underscored that his government would advocate for the protection of the rights of BiH Croats and Bosnia and Herzegovina's European path, but without unfairly making Sweden and Finland's NATO membership conditional on those efforts.
Our task is to explain the status of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina to Finland's and Sweden's prime ministers and win their support for correcting the injustices, and not to call their choice into question, Plenković added.
Without naming President Zoran Milanović, the prime minister thus criticised his insistence to make Finland and Sweden's NATO entry conditional on the reform of Bosnia and Herzegovina's election law. Finland and Sweden have applied for NATO membership in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which started on 24 February.
Earlier on Tuesday, Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin met with President Milanović, who told her that in principle, he was not against Finland's NATO entry but at the same time pointed out the difficult status of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the security problems Croatia is faced with due to lack of stability in BiH.
Marin said that she had a good meeting with Milanović, that his position was very clear and that he did not have any problem with Finland and Sweden joining NATO, adding that she appreciated Croatia's support for Finland's NATO membership.
There is no closer relationship than membership in the same defence alliance and readiness to defend one another unconditionally, Marin said.
Finland and Sweden's NATO membership bid has been met with opposition from Turkey, which says that Helsinki and Stockholm support Kurdish militants and have imposed an arms embargo on Turkey.
Marin expressed optimism at the press conference in Zagreb.
She said that she believed that NATO would send a strong message of unity at a summit in Madrid next week, stressing that Finland and Sweden would make NATO stronger.
The Finnish prime minister also said that Helsinki supported Croatia's membership in the Schengen Area and the euro area.
Finnish PM does not express position on BiH's candidate status
Croatia is not alone in warning about the unjust neglect of Western Balkan countries' EU accession, with Slovenia and Austria especially pointing it out.
Slovenian foreign minister Tanja Fajon said Slovenia would request at the next EU summit that Bosnia and Herzegovina be awarded candidate status, after the Commission last week proposed that Ukraine and Moldova be given EU candidate status.
Plenković said that regardless of the latest initiatives from Austria and Slovenia, if there was one country that supported Bosnia and Herzegovina's candidate status and European path, it was Croatia.
He recalled that Bosnia and Herzegovina applied for EU membership when HDZ BiH leader Dragan Čović was BiH Presidency Chairman.
Plenković underscored the importance of amendment of the country's election law for democracy and for the equality of its constituent peoples.
Asked about Finland's attitude towards conferring candidate status on Bosnia and Herzegovina, Marin said Finland had not adopted a position yet but that it had a long history of supporting EU enlargement.
It is important to seriously consider all issues that are important to member states, she said.
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