Mr President, these days, we cannot talk about Croatia without seeing it in the context of its neighbour Serbia, where the people are now finally throwing off the yoke of the authoritarian government clique. A clique which referred to itself as , but managed to stay in power for more than ten years by using fascist methods alone. Along with legal inequality for the opposition and overt state violence, this also manifested itself in the fact that fear was instilled in the people of Serbia vis-à-vis the big bad world outside and that people who criticised the regime were proclaimed traitor to their own country. The same formula has been applied in Croatia over the past ten years. Croatia is not one of the states we have been discussing this week as being potential future candidate states of the Union. In many respects, the position of that country is the same as that of Slovakia, which is now a candidate state. Up until 1918, both regions were rebellious sections of Hungary and boasted their own language, culture and identity, but were thwarted by the official state authority. International pressure forced them thereafter not to become fully independent, but to join new large collective states which were intended as melting pots for minor Slavonic peoples, but they never managed to integrate properly. When half a century ago, Croatia and Slovakia became nominally independent for the first time, they became vassals of the Hitler regime. In 1945, the outside world agreed that these states should cease to exist permanently. With the benefit of hindsight, this was a silly move. Ignoring the wish of those peoples to be able to make independent decisions, provided the breeding ground for aggressive and authoritarian nationalism for years, a nationalism which had little consideration for the tragic legacy by the Nazi era and which was hostile towards other peoples and democracy at home. People hid behind Tudjman and Meciar because they saw this as the only guarantee for being treated as equals vis-à-vis their neighbours who used to rule over them. It is only now that all their reasonable demands have been met and nobody doubts the right to independence any longer, that nationalism is fading away and normal political alliances are emerging. The nationalists recently lost political power in both countries. This could serve as a lesson for other strongly nationalist regions. The only way to eradicate nationalism is to meet all reasonable demands of those nationalists. There is now every reason for treating Croatia in the same way as Slovakia and other Central European countries which can join the European Union if they so wish. The damage done by the war has not yet been cleared, as we witnessed recently. The country’s road infrastructure is vulnerable because Dalmatia and Slavonia form the two halves of a pair of scissors, as it were, with Bosnia being wedged in the middle, which, particularly in West Herzegovina, is also populated by Croats. The environment in the large population concentrations in Zagreb, Rijeka and Osijek is at risk. This set of circumstances will probably necessitate huge investments, which will not be repaid until later on in the form of tourism and new industry. This is why it would be useful to make the necessary arrangements at this stage. Along with the rapporteur, I do wonder whether the funds will be made available in real terms, especially now it appears that Serbia will also be needing large funds shortly and the Union’s budget is not being increased. There is little point in the European Union making pledges to crisis areas and candidate states , right and centre, which it cannot meet. As far as Croatia is concerned, there is every reason to set up a financial arrangement. The comment which my colleague Mr Papayannakis made yesterday about admitting Serbia to the European Union should also apply to Croatia.

Political group: GUE-NGL