While the details are not that important, this issue again leads one to wonder what kind of termite brains are working in the European Commission and in the various other Foreign Ministries around the globe. Did they not KNOW the Balkans? What morons!
Read and weep. I quote:
In their statement, the ministers urged Croatia not to enforce a 57,000 sq km fisheries protection zone in the Adriatic sea that it proclaimed on January 1 against the wishes of neighbouring Italy and Slovenia.
Croatia has so far taken no steps to enforce the fishery zone. However, whereas Zagreb describes the zone as necessary to curb uncontrolled fishing in the Adriatic, mainly by Italians, Slovenia sees it partly as an attempt to influence the outcome of border disputes that erupted between them after Yugoslavia’s collapse in 1991.
Seen from Croatia’s point of view, Slovenia is exploiting its EU presidency to slow down Zagreb’s EU talks and to make it yield on the fisheries zone issue.
For some older EU member states, the problem goes deeper. They feel torn between the desire to show solidarity with Slovenia and the need not to antagonise Croatia, whose entry is an important plank of the EU’s long-term goal of prosperity and peace in the Balkans.
The dispute has complicated Croatia’s efforts to become the EU’s 28th member state. Croatia started its accession talks in October 2005 but about half of the 33 negotiating chapters, or policy areas, have yet to be opened. No chapters were closed last year.
All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!
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