Minister Grabar-Kitarović participated at National Forum meeting

The fifth meeting of the National Forum discussed the use of pre-accession funds, CARDS, PHARE, ISPA, SAPARD and IPA, in the process of Croatia’s acceding to the EU, as well as the projects financed through the EU funds and their management.

Minister Grabar-Kitarović, talking about the absorption capabilities for using the EU pre-accession assistance as one of the Croatian Government’s priorities in EU accession process, said that Croatia has received numerous commendations from the European Commission for its implementation of the pre-accession programs. She announced the new integral pre-accession assistance program (IPA), that will start to be implemented in 2007. She pointed out that it is extremely important to maintain such good results during the implementation of IPA, as well as to maintain the political support for such projects, employment and, more importantly, keep the highly-educated and specialized civil servants on whose work depends the quality of the results.

The National Forum on Acceding to the EU is an initiative launched by MFAEI with the aim of achieving a better informedness of the Croatian public on the process of Croatia’s EU accession and spark a public debate on the subject in all parts of the Croatian society. The Forum features the representatives of the state authority, local government and self-government, academic community, non-governmental organizations, private sector, media, and other interested groups.