ZAGREB, December 8, 2018 - The Amsterdam coalition, comprising the Croatian Peasant Party (HSS), the Istrian Democratic Party (IDS) and the Civic Liberal Alliance (GLAS), formally exists as of Saturday after their leaders Krešo Beljak, Boris Miletić and Anka Mrak Taritaš signed a coalition agreement for next year's European Parliament elections

The leaders of the three parties said they were "very clearly standing against the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) and those even further down on the right-wing scale."

The party slate has not yet been defined but the three party leaders believe that any of the 12 people on their slate would be able to represent Croatia's interests in the European Parliament.

The Amsterdam coalition said they were open to cooperation with other parties, stressing however that cooperation with the HDZ or Milan Bandić was out of the question.

For more on the European Parliament and Croatia, including the upcoming electrions, click here.

ZAGREB, November 13, 2018 - The European Parliament on Tuesday adopted a report which Croatian MEP Ruža Tomašić submitted on the Multiannual plan for small pelagic stocks in the Adriatic Sea and the fisheries exploiting those stocks, whereby measures for replenishing the stocks in the Adriatic are suggested, instead of the imposition of quotas for the catch of Adriatic fish as proposed by the European Commission, which would seriously affect the fishing industry in Croatia.

"I knew that it would be tough, but we have succeeded. The European Parliament has been the last defence line and our diligent work has halted the Commission's harmful proposal that would have had a devastating effect on Croatia's fisheries, the fish processing industry, tuna fisheries and coastal communities living off fisheries," Tomašić said after her report was endorsed.

She explained that the imposed quota would have restricted the catch in the whole of the Adriatic Sea to 50,000 tonnes of small pelagic fish annually, whereas Croatia's current catch is about 60,000 tonnes and the amount in the region now stands at 100,000 tonnes.

Another Croatian MEP, Ivan Jakovčić, endorsed Tomašić's report and called on the EC to pursue a policy that would be beneficial to the Adriatic fishermen. He explained that the introduction of the quotas as proposed by the EC would have been detrimental to the blue growth in the Adriatic region.

Dubravka Šuica, also one Croatia's 11 MEPs, reported that she supported Tomašić's reports and that she had not endorsed the EC's proposal for incorporating a set of measures into a multi-annual plan for the Adriatic Sea that would manage the fisheries in the Adriatic Sea based on the Biomass Escapement Strategy and a quota system.

For more on the European Parliament and the activities of the members elected in Croatia, click here.

ZAGREB, October 28, 2018 - Leaders of GLAS, the Istrian Democratic Party (IDS) and the Primorje‑Gorski Kotar Alliance (PGS) said on Sunday they were preparing for next spring's European Union elections, working on a programme for the European Parliament, and that they expected to have two MEPs again.

Speaking at a press conference in Opatija, GLAS president Anka Mrak Taritaš said the three parties making up the Amsterdam Coalition would present their platform and 12 candidates for the European Parliament in a month's time. She said they wanted to remind citizens of the importance of the EU elections and European values.

This is a watershed moment for the EU as the next elections will decide the direction it will take and we want Croatia to be represented by people advocating liberal democracy, Mrak Taritaš said, adding that they did not want populism.

IDS president Boris Miletić said European elections were important because the bulk of Croatian legislation depended on EU legislation. He asked if Hungary and Poland were indicative of Europe or if Europe was a project of peace and open borders.

PGS vice president Tea Mičić Badurina said Croatia was highly centralised, economically devastated and ideologically divided and that this was fertile ground for neoconservative and populist movements which could cause even greater damage. She said Croatian citizens needed someone who would guarantee a stable environment, security and their rights.

Asked if the Croatian Peasant Party (HSS) would join the Amsterdam Coalition, Mrak-Taritaš said the HSS had decided to start negotiations to that end. Asked if this meant a coalition with the HSS for Croatia's next parliamentary election, she said they were now focused solely on the European elections.

As for other parties, Mrak Taritaš said they did not want a coalition with someone who was in a coalition with the ruling HDZ or with Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić. As for the Social Democratic Party (SDP), she said it seemed it would run in the European elections independently. She would not say if a coalition with the SDP was possible for Croatia's parliamentary election.

Asked if the Amsterdam Coalition would back former SDP leader Zoran Milanović if he decided to run for president, Mrak Taritaš said that, in case he did, he would reach out to them and that they would then decide by consensus.

HDZ has announced it would probably run for the European Parliament without its coalition partners.

ZAGREB, October 27, 2018 - Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Saturday that his Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) party would most likely run in elections for the European Parliament independently, voicing confidence that it would win.

Asked by reporters in Split if the HDZ would run in the spring 2019 polls independently, Plenković said they had not talked about it yet but most probably they would because they had many great potential candidates. He is confident the HDZ will win the elections because, he said, it runs a pro-European government and is part of the biggest political family in Europe, so it should contribute to the victory of the European People's Party.

Plenković dismissed the accusations of a referendum initiative for changing election legislation concerning the counting of the signatures collected. He said he saw nothing contentious in the count and that the Public Administration Ministry had invited everyone wishing to check the signatures declared invalid to do so, calling this highly transparent.

Asked if Croatia should put up a barrier along the border with Bosnia and Herzegovina given the migrant crisis, he said "we are not at that stage." "Croatia's border police, with 6,300 members, is protecting our border and preventing illegal migration in cooperation with the border police forces of our neighbours."

Plenkovicćsaid there would be no government reshuffle despite the fact that Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić's party now had ten MPs. He said Bandić was not asking for nor being offered anything.

He was speaking to the press after a meeting of the HDZ's Split county branch, which discussed what the government is doing for Dalmatia and other coastal regions as well as islands.

Interested in following more about politics in Croatia? Total Croatia News has a dedicated politics section with several articles posted daily. You can follow the TCN political section here.

ZAGREB, October 26, 2018 - Croatia's European parliamentarians wanted to additionally raise awareness about the status of Bosnian Croats with their letter to the presidents of the European Parliament, Council and Commission about the need for legitimate representation of Croats in all institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina and particularly in its presidency, Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Friday, adding that he wasn't planning to meet with the presidency's newly-elected Croat member, Željko Komšić, just yet.

"I think that the message by eleven of my colleagues is entirely compatible with what I said in the European Council. This letter should additionally sensitise the leaders of European institutions about the need for legitimate representation in all institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in particular in its presidency because the meaning of the Dayton or Paris peace accords is not to undermine its fundamental essence, its fundamental provisions of the equality of the constituent peoples," Plenković told the press.

Yesterday Croatia's MEPs sent a letter to EU officials expressing deep concern with the fact that the Croat member to the presidency, Željko Komšić, was elected by Bosniak voters while the majority of Croats voted for another candidate, Dragan Čović.

Asked whether he would meet with Komšić soon, the prime minister said that he hadn't planned to. "He is a member of the presidency and his main counterpart is the President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović. We haven't planned anything of that nature yet," Plenković said.

Asked about the recent incidents with migrants at the Maljevac border crossing, Plenković said that Interior Minister Davor Božinović was in daily contact with the European Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship, Dimitris Avramopoulos and that the commission was monitoring everything that is being done to prevent illegal migration.

The Maljevac - Velika Kladuša crossing between Bosnia and Croatia is still closed for the third day in a row, the Interior Ministry reported earlier on Friday. About 200 migrants are situated on the Bosnian side of the border and are being monitored by Bosnian border police who are tasked to prevent the migrants from illegally crossing the border.

ZAGREB, October 19, 2018 - The thistimeimvoting.eu non-political campaign aimed at motivating European Union citizens to vote in the May 2019 European elections was presented at Europe House in Zagreb on Friday.

ZAGREB, October 7, 2018 - The European Parliament has recently adopted a few reports prepared by Croatian MEP Ivana Maletić, and two of them were about the simplification of the procedure for certain rules and definitive system for the Value Added Tax in cross-border trade between Member-States and on administrative cooperation in the field of excise duties as regards the content of electronic register, according to a press release issued by the Office of MEP Maletić.

ZAGREB, September 10, 2018 - The opposition Živi Zid party said on Monday it had reported the Istrian Democratic Party's (IDS) Member of the European Parliament Ivan Jakovčić to the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) for receiving fees as a member of the Afarak company's supervisory board during his term as an MEP.

ZAGREB, August 31, 2018 - Member of the European Parliament Ivan Jakovčić of the Istrian Democratic Party (IDS) said on Friday that due to his role in recent developments concerning the ailing Uljanik shipyard, he would not run in the next European elections.

ZAGREB, June 13, 2018 - Members of the European Parliament on Wednesday gave their consent to a new distribution of MEP seats after the 2019 elections which will lead to a reduction in the overall number of seats after the UK's withdrawal from the EU comes into force.