Prelude to the Zagreb Summit Conference

AIM Zagreb, November 21, 2000

Ministers of the European Union have given their approval for the beginning of negotiations with Croatia on its joining the institutions in Brussels. The negotiations will formally begin at the Zagreb summit conference to be held on November 24, which will be attended, as confirmed, by all the countries of the EU. In this way Europe has kept its promise that it would not come to Zagreb empty-handed.

In parallel with the official Zagreb, unofficial Croatia is also making preparations for the summit. On the one hand, all sorts of groups for defence of the dignity of the homeland war are opposed to the organisation of the gathering in Zagreb, on the other, non-governmental organisations are trying to help it with their proposals. Zealous nationalistic groups claim that the summit is an introduction into an unwanted union inclining towards the East or the Balkan. According to them, this is an attempt of revival of Yugoslavia or Balkanisation of Croatia. They are also opposed to the arrival of new Yugoslav president Kostunica to Zagreb and demand his apology. Embittered workers of a few Zagreb companies that are facing bankruptcy have also announced protests, but the police has not issued consent for their gathering, which practically means that it has banned it. Trade unions now claim that they will file a Constitutional appeal against this decision.

Last week, on the eve of the summit in Zagreb, a few non-governmental organisations from Zagreb, Sarajevo and Novi Sad, organised a debate on the prospects for the relations between Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia and FR Yugoslavia. Participants at this gathering addressed their set of proposals to the big summit. Their conclusions refer to opening of the borders, full liberalisation of the border crossing regime for all the three states, cooperation with the Tribunal in the Hague, urgent and unconditioned mutual recognition of Yugoslavia and Bosnia & Herzegovina

In the discussion, on several occasions the question was raised of the level of democracy established after the election in Croatia and FR Yugoslavia that brought about the overthrow of the former regimes. In this connections there are mostly no illusions. For instance, Nenad Canak, the new chairman of the Voivodina Assembly, claims that the present situation can be described as follows: in Serbia – Greater Serbian aspirations and hegemony as the majority state of mind, and nationalistic disposition with strong xenophobia in Croatia.

He looks upon the absence of the opposition in both states as a specially acute problem. The general opinion is that the until recently ruling parties, the Croat Democratic Community (HDZ) in Croatia and Milosevic's Socialists in Serbia, cannot be a normal democratic opposition. They are the opposition to the authorities only by the fact that they are interested in returning to power; they are not interested in democracy. Someone has said: HDZ cannot be the opposition, it can just be the obstruction. Since there can be no democratic authorities without democratic opposition, this is a serious handicap. A large number of the participants of the gathering in Zagreb believe that the role of democratic opposition in these countries must be taken over by non-governmental organisations and various citizens' initiatives.

The attitude of such crippled, uncompleted democracies towards Bosnia & Herzegovina is especially interesting. The general stand of the Bosnians, regardless of ethnic origin, is that the new authorities in Zagreb and Belgrade, which present themselves to the world as non-nationalistic or less nationalistic than the previous ones, in fact support the nationalistic forces in Bosnia & Herzegovina. Along with the catastrophically bad policy of the international community, this is recognised as the main reason for the unfavourable outcome of recent elections in B&H. Kostunica has evidently supported the Serb Democratic Party (SDS); he did not even wish to see the moderate Dodik.

Bosnian Croats were especially sharp in their evaluation of the policy of the new authorities in Croatia. Ivo Komsic, for example, established that the policy of Racan's government to Bosnia & Herzegovina practically does not differ from that of Tudjman's. The motives might be different, but the ultimate outcome is similar. The ruling coalition in Croatia actually supports B&H HDZ, Komsic claims. According to him nationalism in Bosnia & Herzegovina may be conquered only by bringing out in the open the whole truth about the past war. Based on the minutes from a meeting of Franjo Tudjman with B&H Croats in the end of 1991, he concludes that, first, a Croatian project on division of Bosnia & Herzegovina had existed; second, that a part of that project was ethnic cleansing of territories; and third, that the conflicts and the war were planned as a means for the achievement of the devised ends. Instead of the truth, however, the new Croatian regime passed a declaration in its assembly with which the facts about the past war are forged.

Mentioning that the recent HDZ referendum organised from the same standpoint from which Tudjman advanced in 1991, Komsic says that he is astonished that the current Croatian government has continued financing such policy – not only by paying the army, the Croat Defence Council (HVO), but also by actually maintaining the structure of HDZ through various associations. As a cherry on top he stated a ghastly detail. Young soldiers in HVO are instructed to see in the target they shoot at while practising – president Mesic. Mesic is a great opponent to Tudjman's policy towards B&H. The absurdity is complete: the bullets with which these soldiers practise shooting at Mesic are financed from the budget of the country he is the president of.

Marko Tadic, the recently relieved of duty head of the university in Mostar, removed because of his cooperation with Bosniac institutions, also claims that the regime in Croatia has contributed to pre-election homogenisation of B&H Croats. He thinks that Racan's government is not even aware of what is going on. And according to him, what is going on is that Mostar has become not only the ideological and logistic centre of B&H HDZ, but also of HDZ of Croatia. The centre of HDZ has moved from Zagreb to Mostar. From that centre anti-democratic revolution of HDZ is exported to Croatia. Its goal is to overthrow the present regime. Furthermore, B&H HDZ is gradually drawing Croatia into its conflict with the international community. And finally, the same paradox: all that is financed from Croatian budget. “B&H HDZ derives its entire force from the state budget of Croatia”, says Tadic, so it turns out that the regime in Zagreb is paying those who are preparing its ruin.

Everything said leads to the conclusion that the new authorities are prolonging the policy of their predecessors, not consciously perhaps, because that would have been their own policy, but due to conformity, incompetence, in order not to be resented. They are in fact prolonging it because they are not ready or because they are incapable for a decisive and radical shift. Non-governmental organisations called upon the heads of the states and governments of the countries that will gather at Zagreb summit to resolutely condemn “the attempts to spread the spectre of nationalistic frenzy across borders”, and especially to disassociate themselves from such practice towards Bosnia & Herzegovina.

Jelena Lovric

(AIM)