The President of the Croatian Parliament, Gordan Jandroković, on Monday, while commenting on the threats from Slovenia and Hungary that they would withhold support for Croatia’s accession to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), stated that the politics of pressure or blackmail is not good and ultimately will not yield results.
“One must be cool-headed, warm-hearted, and defend one’s national interests. We have already witnessed the politics of blackmail during the EU accession process; Slovenia used such methods back then and ultimately gained nothing from it. I believe that this time such logic (…) will not yield results, but will only prolong the problem,” Jandroković stated when asked what to do after Slovenia threatened to withhold support due to arbitration.
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“In our view, the arbitration process was deeply compromised and contaminated due to the behavior of the Slovenian side, which is why we did not recognize the arbitration ruling, but now we want to resolve these problems and border issues in a new framework, namely through bilateral talks,” Jandroković said in the program ‘S Markova trga’ on Croatian Radio.
Regarding Hungary, he reminded that the Hungarians announced a blockade not only against Croatia but also against Romania. It is evident that on the Hungarian side, there is also consideration that bilateral issues would be resolved through pressures or possibly blackmail. I believe that this is not a good approach, and we will seek solutions that will protect Croatian national interests, the Speaker of the Parliament stated.
