Franco Frattini: Italy Is Lobbying For Croatia

Italian Foreign Affairs Minister advocated solidarity and facilitating Croatia`s European Union accession.

Italian Foreign Affairs Minister Franco Frattini visited the Zagreb Faculty of Political Sciences, accompanied by his Croatian counterpart Gordan Jandrokovic, where he held a brief lecture on the future of the European Union, with the emphasis on the Lisbon treaty and the upcoming expansion.

Apart from the Faculty`s dean Vlatko Cvrtila, many representatives of diplomatic, political and academic circles attended the lecture of the former European Commission vice president.

Visiting Croatia, Frattini arrived with the goal of stimulating solidarity and facilitating Croatian European integrations accession.

When asked about the sort of political instruments Italy was using to facilitate Croaita`s EU accession, Minister Frattini replied that through partnership and signed memorandums, progress in solving bilateral issues between Slovenia and Croatia has been made.

- We have comprehensive memoranda on collaboration, neighbourhood strategy which is a common one, that`s why I will propose to the current Czech Republic Presidency of EU while respecting the bilateral context and negotiations or discussions in the framework of the two bilateral committees, one of those will meet in a few days` time. I will ask the Presidency of the EU for intervening in facilitating in spirit of European solidarity finding a solution –Franco Frattini said.

In the end of the lecture, Frattini looked back on the issue of bilateral relations, which have to be solved separately from the influence of the European Union, with the goal of maintaining good-neighbourly relations, which automatically speed up Croatia`s EU membership accession process.

Watch the attached video: Franco Frattini: Italy Is Lobbying For Croatia (please note that the video is both in Croatian and English).