Minister Gordan Jandroković held on the sidelines of the SEECP summit in Chisinau a bilateral meeting with Antonio Milošoski

Minister Jandroković expressed satisfaction with very good and amicable relations between the Republic of Croatia and the Republic of Macedonia. He also expressed satisfaction with cooperation within the Regional Cooperation Council and his assurance that both countries will continue their contribution to the overall development of our region through regional projects and initiatives that were launched under the auspices of the Council.

The Minister congratulated Macedonia on the successfully completed elections and the evaluation it received in the European Commission Report concerning the readiness of the states in the Western Balkans to be included in the visa-free regime of the European Union.

The Minister pointed out that Macedonia has support from the Republic of Croatia for membership in NATO, reminding about the long-standing alliance in the ISAF operation in Afghanistan. In the talks concerning Croatian accession to full membership of the European Union, he noted that Croatian accession negotiations have strategic importance for other countries in the region as well, and that their continuation was important not only for the stability and future of the region, but also for completing the European project in general. The Minister said that Croatia was willing to continue sharing the knowledge and experiences acquired in the process of accession to the European Union, adding that the Republic of Croatia had no intention of raising bilateral issues in the negotiation process or use the process to solve them. With regard to the current status, the Minister pointed out that Croatia is intensively fulfilling the remaining obligations in order to complete the technical part of negotiations by end-2009, in accordance with the final term set in the Road Map.

The Ministers also discussed the global economic crisis and its influence on Croatia and Macedonia. They agreed that the negative impacts of the crisis could be overcome more smoothly with an increase in mutual economic cooperation, and that the issue of free trade was crucial for economic stability of the countries in the region. The need to raise the standards and quality of production of agricultural and other products and their harmonisation with the EU legislation was underlined. They also discussed the need to speed up the process of succession and the already agreed return of property of the former Yugoslavia.