Croatia has raised a number of issues in Montenegro's accession negotiations with the European Union (EU) that have been unresolved for years, and the country's further progress will depend on their resolution, Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said today.
"Croatia has opened a series of issues that have remained unresolved for years, and if there is progress, we will continue to talk," Plenković replied in Tirana to a question from Montenegrin journalists about when negotiations in Chapter 31 - Foreign, Security and Defense Policy - can be expected to be closed, N1 Croatia reports.
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Upon arriving at the European Political Community summit in Tirana, he explained that talks were underway at the level of the foreign ministries of Croatia and Montenegro on compensation for Croatian prisoners of war and people who were tortured in the early 1990s, as well as a number of other open issues.
Montenegro closed three negotiation chapters in December last year after seven years. It had expected to close four of them, but Croatia did not give its consent to close Chapter 31, according to N1 Croatia.
Croatian Foreign Minister Gordan Grlić Radman stated at the time that Croatia was not blocking Montenegro over a bilateral issue.
"Croatia will certainly not raise bilateral issues as a condition for Montenegro's European path, but the issue of missing persons during the Homeland War, the issue of compensation for concentration camp inmates - these are topics that must concern all of us within the European Union, not just Croatia," Grlić-Radman said in December last year.
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