ZAGREB, 8 March 2022 - Marking International Women's Day, the non-governmental organisation U ime obitelji (In the Name of the Family) said on Tuesday that the two most frequent forms of social injustice that a lot of women in Croatia are faced with is working on Sunday and the the discrimination women who choose to be mothers are subjected to on the labour market.

The NGO underscored that tens of thousands of women who work six days a week are compelled out of fear of losing their jobs to work a seventh day, Sundays and public holidays, without any or with a minimum benefit.

In addition, women who choose to be mothers are left without jobs after falling pregnant, or when they return from maternity leave they are often demoted to a less paid job.

"Recently, we have witnessed an especially negative campaign and stigmatisation of women who choose to stay at home and dedicate themselves to raising their children and caring for their families. Those attacks were launched from positions of political power, focused on beneficiaries of stay at home parenting," the NGO said.

The NGO said that in a plural society every woman has to have the right to choose what sort of life she considers to be the most appropriate for her and her family. The NGO also considers that it is important to financially value often unnoticed work done by women in the family. 

The NGO called on women to report any form of discrimination and on employers and the competent authorities to consistently implement the law. The NGO also called on the government to take the necessary steps to ensure non-working Sundays as a free day for the family and to prevent any discrimination, particularly against pregnant women and mothers.

Congratulating women on International Women's Day, the NGO greeted all women, especially those who, despite the numerous obstacles and pressure, manage to successfully balance their family and work life.

ZAGREB, 10 Dec 2021 - On the occasion of Human Rights Day, NGOs warned of a low level of social and economic rights in Croatia and called for the improvement of public services and for reconstruction of earthquake-struck areas to be accelerated.

"Healthcare, social welfare, housing and education have to be accessible to everyone. Public services need reliable support which inevitably includes long-term public investments and progressive taxation so as not to deepen the social inequality," the NGOs said in a press release.

The associations particularly highlighted the absence of strategic documents for marginalised groups such as the homeless or refugees.

Workers' rights deteriorated, inaccessible and inadequate healthcare

They warned that for years labour rights have deteriorated, and of inaccessible and inadequate healthcare, a poor social welfare system, absence of policies to enable secure housing and to remove inequality in access to education.

The corona crisis made all these problems more pronounced, they said.

Labour conditions in many sectors have been worsened and jobs are insecure while the health system could not care simultaneously both for COVID patients and other patients, which jeopardised the right to health, they added.

The social welfare system does not have enough capacities to resolve burning issues and to ensure protection for the most vulnerable groups.

Gov't inept for earthquake reconstruction

Another acute problem is the "terribly slowness, incapability and unwillingness of government to start rebuilding in earthquake-hit areas."

Most people have been left to their own devices, particularly in central Croatia and they will be spending at least one more winter in inadequate conditions.

They noted the importance of the Future is Public manifest, which has been signed by 200 organisations around the world seeking public services that will meet individual and collective needs and reduce inequality and will protect the dignity of all members of society.

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ZAGREB, 5 Oct, 2021 - An NGO called Croatia Green Building Council on Tuesday signed an agreement with the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB), a Stuttgart-based non-profit organisation, on the DGNB system for certification of sustainable buildings, building interiors and districts.

The DGNB Certification System, a second-generation system compared to other international certification systems, includes assessment which revolves around ecological aspects, DGNB says.

DGNB-certified buildings consume fewer resources during construction, have lower greenhouse gas emissions and largely can be recycled.

The DGNB director, Christine Lemaitre, said today in Zagreb after the agreement-signing ceremony that she was glad to see that Croatian partners opted for promoting the DGNB system.

The head of the Croatian NGO, Dean Smolar, explained that the system was adjusted to EU regulations and the Life Level(s) project which is being implemented by the Croatia Green Building Council.

To date, over 8,200 public and private buildings and districts in 27countries worldwide have acquired DGNB certificates.

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ZAGREB, 7 Sept, 2021 - A network of civil society organisations called "Fourth Shift - Invisible Work" on Tuesday launched a campaign to raise awareness of women's unpaid household work and encourage the creation of public policies to achieve a work-life balance for women and men.

The campaign is part of the project "The impact of public policies on the quality of family and working life and on the demographic picture of Croatia," led by the women's civil society organisation B.a.B.e.

The value of the project is HRK 3.6 million (€480,000), of which 85 percent is provided by the EU and the rest by the government. Its duration is 36 months, and it is being conducted in Zagreb and eight other regions.

The organisations have invited women to join the campaign by sharing their stories on what happens when they stop doing their everyday chores. They can share their stories and photographs on the Instagram and Facebook accounts of B.a.b.e. and the Twitter account of Iskra B., or if they want their post to remain anonymous they can send an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

The organisations wonder what kind of chaos would happen if women in Croatia stopped ironing, cleaning, cooking, doing the laundry and taking care of children. They say that such a scenario is indicated by the results of a 2017 survey carried out by sociologist Ksenija Klasnić.

The survey revealed that in 83 percent of the cases examined all or the majority of routine household tasks are performed by women, in 16.6 percent of cases partners equally share household chores, while men do housework on their own only in 0.4% of cases.

In 58.4 percent of cases, all or most work relating to child care is done by women, while men take care of children on their own only in 0.2% of cases. In the rest of the cases women and men share their child care duties.

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ZAGREB, 3 Aug, 2021 - AEPO-ARTIS, a non-profit organisation that represents over 650 performing artists, has sent a letter to the Croatian culture minister criticising Croatia for being late with the adoption of new copyright legislation and missing a deadline for the implementation of two EU directives, the Croatian Musicians Union said on Tuesday.

The organisation said that the implementation of the Copyright Directive and the Directive on online transmissions and retransmissions was being delayed because Croatia was late with the adoption of the new Copyright and Related Rights Act.

The letter, signed by AEPO-ARTIS secretary general Ioan Kaes, says that the COVID-19 pandemic has widened the gap between the growth of profit by online giants and individual artists because the latter do not participate in the fair distribution of this turnover.

The situation is particularly dramatic because in the new business circumstances the turnover of online platforms has become a dominant source of income for the music industry. For over a year and a half, performing artists have been denied their basic source of income - live performances, while at the same time the use and turnover of their recordings increased and performers could not enjoy their rights equally with others. Although their works still reach wide online audiences, artists receive small or no remuneration for them, according to the letter.

The institute of performers' inalienable right to remuneration is not incorporated into the proposal for the new Copyright and Related Rights Act, and under the proposal, record companies would be given an additional three years to adjust their business. This would allow Croatian record companies to continue their unfair and unethical practice of blackmailing performing artists and not paying them for the performances that have been used by online services for years, the letter said.

AEPO-ARTIS concluded by saying that introducing the inalienable right to remuneration, which artists would be able to exercise through their collective management organisations, is the best, if not the only, solution that guarantees that artists receive appropriate and proportionate remuneration for their work.

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ZAGREB, 3 Aug, 2021 - Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and six other NGOs on Tuesday criticised the new Croatian border monitoring mechanism, expressing concern about the body's independence and efficiency.

Recent media reports and official statements about the newly established border monitoring mechanism raise serious concerns, especially over the body's mandate, efficiency and independence, Amnesty International, Are You Syrious, the Centre for Peace Studies, the Danish Refugee Council, Human Rights Watch, the International Rescue Committee, Refugee Rights Europe and Save the Children said in a joint press release.

The Croatian government announced that the negotiations on the mechanism have concluded, but has not publicly disclosed further details about its structure or functioning, according to the press release.

The independent mechanism should monitor the treatment of illegal migrants by police officers, following several reports by NGOs of violations of migrants' rights at the border, which the Croatian government denies. The establishment of the mechanism was earlier proposed by the European Commission.

"Any border monitoring mechanism should be independent in law and practice and have sufficient resources and a robust mandate to monitor border-related operations anywhere on the territory of a state," the NGOs said.

The source of contention is the fact that according to the NGOs, the mechanism's mandate would be limited to police stations near the border and border crossings, while most contentious actions of the Croatian authorities take place further away from them, the press release says.

The objection also referred to the involvement of other institutions and organisations.

"To ensure that the mechanism is credible and effective, it needs to involve independent institutions or organisations that have monitoring experience – such as civil society organisations, United Nations agencies, and national human rights institutions – that are not financially dependent on the government;" they said, adding that any mechanisms that do not meet such standards could undermine the European Commission's efforts to end violence on the Union's external borders.

"The Commission should actively review and assess the mechanism to ensure that Croatian authorities put in place a system that can credibly monitor compliance with EU law in border operations and should provide political and financial support only to a system that meets the above standards," the NGOs said.

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ZAGREB, 11 May, 2021 - The Rijeka-based LORI lesbian association and the Rainbow Families association of LGBTIQ couples and individuals who have or want to have children will file a report with the local prosecutorial authorities over the burning of a rainbow flag on the City Hall building.

In the night between May 7 and 8, a video of the burning of the flag was posted on the Instagam profile "riječani.1987", which is linked with the Armada football fan group, with the message: "This is the response to the newly-adopted law on adoption by same-sex couples."

LORI and the Rainbow Families said they would file a report for incitement to violence and hate and causing damage to another's property.  

The two associations said they expected a prompt reaction by the competent state institutions, with LORI recalling that in 2020 it filed a report with the Rijeka prosecutor's office over graffiti saying "Kill faggots", sprayed on a window of the Rijeka City Hall after an exhibition dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the association was staged there.

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ZAGREB, 7 May, 2021 - The Croatian Parliament is the only parliament in the European Union that, on the pretext of the coronavirus pandemic, has not been publishing reports on the voting of MPs for a year, the non-governmental organisation GONG said on Friday, considering this to be an attack on democracy.

"The epidemic has seriously affected the democratic standards in the work of the Croatian Parliament. It is unacceptable that since March 2020 and the declaration of the state of the pandemic, the Sabor has denied the public key information on the work of lawmakers, hiding behind the epidemiological measures and the shortcomings of the electronic voting system, which is designed for use only in the main chamber," GONG said in a statement.

The governing parties are relying on a slim majority of 76 MPs in the 151-seat Parliament, and the information on how each lawmaker voted on a bill is of great interest to the public, it noted.

GONG said that Parliament has been neglecting the basic democratic standards in adapting to the epidemiological measures, recalling that the Constitutional Court had found the provisions of Parliament's Rules of Procedure limiting the number of MPs at plenary sessions to be unconstitutional.

It said that after the Constitutional Court ruling Parliament Speaker Gordan Jandroković had announced a possibility of forming a task force to draw up amendments to the Rules of Procedure, but that six months have gone by since then and there has been no mention of amendments any more.

GONG appealed to Parliament to start looking for a way to regain the public confidence it has lost and urged MPs to demand greater accountability from Parliament.

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ZAGREB, 10 March, 2021 - Prime Minister Andrej Plenković on Wednesday met with a delegation of the Women's Room NGO to discuss measures to curb violence against women and they agreed on the preparation of a national strategy to combat sexual violence.

Maja Mamula and Anamarija Drožđan-Kranjčec from the Women's Room informed the Prime Minister of the activities of their organisation, which includes the Centre for Victims of Sexual Violence which provides direct help and support to victims of sexual violence.

The talks underlined the need for raising public awareness of the problem of sexual violence, strengthening prevention and implementing education about that problem at all levels.

The two sides agreed on drafting a national strategy for the prevention of sexual violence, which will involve all relevant departments and civil society organisations.

There was also talk of amendments to the Criminal Code regarding the combatting of sexual violence, which have been prepared and should soon be put to public consultation.

The main amendments concern redefining the prosecution of sexual harassment to enable its ex-officio prosecution, which is something the government has already announced.

Under the amendments, there will be no statute of limitations on child abuse.

The meeting also discussed activities implemented by the Ministry of Labour, Pension System, Family and Social Policy in order to establish shelters for victims of violence in all counties, the related media campaign and cooperation with civil society organisations.

The Women's Room delegation welcomed the fact that the need for a strategic document to combat sexual violence had been recognised as well as the announced legislative amendments.

Prime Minister Plenković thanked the delegation for their cooperation and work on raising awareness of the problem of violence, notably their activities in providing support to victims of sexual violence.

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ZAGREB, 9 March, 2021 - The Friends of Animals association said on Tuesday that its petition, launched to ban chaining dogs, had so far been signed by more than 40,000 people and that its initiative had also been supported by associations of veterinarians. 

The NGO said that it had sent a letter to the government calling on it to urgently amend the Animal Welfare Act and that it expected a positive response.

It said that its initiative had been supported by the most important veterinarian associations, including the Croatian Veterinary Chamber.

In a letter of support for the campaign, Croatian Veterinary Chamber head Ivan Zemljak says the campaign will contribute to raising the standards of animal protection and welfare in Croatia.

Veterinarian Tatjana Zajec has said that dogs are social animals so their long-term confinement or chaining can cause serious damage to their physical or psychological well-being.

Dogs that are chained lack sufficient play and activity, are not taught to happily co-exist with other animals and humans and are therefore frequently dangerous for everyone around them, veterinarians warn.

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