Zagreb To Reply To EU Border Mediation Offer Mar.9

Most analysts believe Croatia will be unable to complete its EU entry talks this year, as planned, unless a solution is found by mid-March.

Croatia will decide by March 9 whether to accept the European Union's offer to mediate in Zagreb's border row with Slovenia, which is blocking its EU membership bid, the state news agency Hina reported on Monday.

Slovenia has vetoed 12 chapters, or one-third, of Croatia's accession negotiations, saying the documents Zagreb submitted were prejudicial to their 18-year-old border dispute, which involves small bits of land and the northern Adriatic Sea.

Most analysts believe Croatia will be unable to complete its EU entry talks this year, as planned, unless a solution is found by mid-March.

Prime Minister Ivo Sanader failed to break the deadlock at his first meeting with Slovenian Prime Minister Borut Pahor last week and set up a multi-party commission on Monday to draft a response. "We welcome the EU's offer to mediate, but we need to discuss their mandate," Sanader told Hina without elaborating.

Slovenia has accepted the European Commission's offer for former Finnish President and Nobel peace prize winner Marti Ahtisaari to mediate in the dispute, which began when the two quit socialist Yugoslavia in 1991 and declared independence.

Croatia has said it would prefer the dispute to be handled by the International Court of Justice in The Hague, but has not rejected EU mediation outright.