Interview With General Zeljko Glasnovic

General Zeljko Glasnovic
Independent Member of Croatian Parliament for the Croatian Diaspora

 

Interview by Dario Holenda/Fenix Magazin

(Translated to English by Ina Vukic, with permission from Fenix Magazine)

“For positive and effective change in Croatia’s public administration – nationally conscious people are needed, not lizards that change colours as needed and whose mental set has remained on the other side of the Berlin Wall”

General, 28 years have passed since the proclamation of the independence of the Republic of Croatia and the collapse of the Communist regime. Is Croatia today a free and democratic country?

Croatia has not yet emerged from a single-party system. Croatia and Slovenia are the only post-communist countries in the EU that have not implemented a lustration law. Croatia continues to be a deep-seated UDBa state (UDBa/Communist Yugoslavia Secret Police) in which the old communist elites have taken over not only the political but also the cultural space. The mainstream media permanently blocks this truth. That failed experiment was based on the abolition of state, of private property, of faith (mostly Christian) and what is most destructive – on the abolition of the family. Wherever this single-party system ruled, it left behind a terrible legacy of economic and ecological destruction. More than 30% of the global population today still lives under communist regimes. Since the Bolshevik Revolution that “red plague” is responsible for the death of at least 110 million souls. The true image of Bolshevik Satanism is hidden within those statistics. Out of these 110 million victims, 102 million were members of ones own people. A further 100 million people were tortured and imprisoned. Snitching has become a virtue in those regimes. Although the crimes of socialist nationalism are well known, the largest criminal organisation in history – the communist international – has never been brought before the International Court of Justice for class genocide, aristocide (killing of social and intellectual elites), violent seizures of property and systemic memoricide (deletion of collective memory of nations). That is why everyone has heard about Auschwitz today, but no one can name any of the death camps in Cambodia during Pol Pot’s rule, during which one-third of that country’s population was annihilated. More than 100 camps were in operation in the Soviet Union until the fall of the Berlin Wall. More than 18 million prisoners passed through that network of camps known as the Gulags. An averagely informed person cannot name any of those torture places in which people died from cold, undernourishment and exploitation to death. Did you know that the largest communist camp of forced labour was established in Romania after 1945. About 300,000 Romanians were killed by the communist terror in that country.

The first Croatian President, Dr. Franjo Tuđman, based his policy on the idea of reconciliation. Did reconciliation give results?

Unfortunately not! Without truth and justice reconciliation is impossible and remains an illusion. The (Josip) Perkovic – (Zdravko) Mustac case confirms that the old structures to this day prevent the discovery of the historical truth. Croatians outside the Homeland must be aware of the fact that UDBa informers had infiltrated all their patriotic organisations. In the former system, snitching had become a virtue and a proof of criminal single-party dictatorship. It further destroyed the moral-ethical code of people in SFRY. Communism can be described as the “terror of every one against everybody at any time” and you can see yourself that this country is just a continuation of the UDBa communist caliphate. The same mindset, the same cadres and their heirs are in all the levels of Croatian society. Partisan disease and Kozara hysteria belong to non-curable pathology. One dies twice from this mental illness, spiritual death and physical death. It would only mention that in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 10, Jesus commanded his apostles to “cast out demons.” The Croatian social elite suffers from owning and taking possession of entire legions of unclean spirits that still oppress us through various non-governmental organisations, media and individuals in public life. We have countless examples like the anal alpinist Danijel Majic and the rectal climber Drago Pilsel who would make gaming dice out of their mother’s joints just to earn a Kuna or a Euro. If they don’t convert such Judas will be buried in Loncar’s field as their not so famous predecessor. Such characters, i.e. CULTURAL MARXISM, are the greatest threat to Christian Europe.

Was it necessary to implement lustration in Croatia and when was the best time for it?

It’s never too late for lustration! The optimal moment for the implementation of personnel lustration was in March 1994, when the former UDBA structures tried to execute a coup d’etat in the Croatian Parliament. Tudjman made a mistake when he thought these people could change. It is an anthropological problem because the mindset of the Yugozomboids is of a pathological nature. Tuđman was the product of the same system. He set up (Josip) Manolic as secretary, who de facto led the personnel policy. He put (Josip) Boljkovac to run the Ministry of Internal Affairs and (Josip) Perkovic to manage the secret services. Lustration is based on three levels:

  • Facing the historical truth
  • Opening all archives and returning archive material from Belgrade
  • Personnel lustration

We must be aware that the dossiers on present judges, faculty professors, politicians and others are still in Belgrade. The UDBA also infiltrated all religious communities. Individuals with dossiers are living in fear of being exposed because UDBA agents who have kept them connected are blackmailing them today and, with that, pose a threat to national security.

There has been talk in the past that Tuđman created 200 wealthy families that would rule Croatia. Many citizens today are dissatisfied with conversion and privatisation. How do you think the process of transition from the planned economy and state ownership to the free market, private property and capitalism should have looked like?

The cause and solution of privatisation is at the source! The whole product and failed social experiment, called the SFRY, came to a total collapse during the eighties. At that time, only two countries had a higher hyperinflation, namely Brazil and Zimbabwe. Privatisation did not begin in 1990. Red executives knew best the value of state-owned companies in the open market. Those who led the SFRY to bankruptcy continued the practice after 1990. Croatia today suffers the consequences of this plunder that has been carried out since 1945 through the abomination known as confiscation and nationalisation. Today, only 5% of land registers are properly registered, and the cadastre is the same one as the one from the Austro-Hungarian times. Despite possible war damages from the nineties, Croatia, in accordance with the international succession treaty, is paying almost 33% of the debt of former Yugoslavia, which amounted to about 20 billion US Dollars before the breakup of the state. It is important to note that Serbia, led by Slobodan Milosevic, in May 1990 usurped $ 5 billion that belonged to all republics. Milosevic also exchanged another $ 5 billion of Russia’s and Iraq’s debt for gas and oil. The SFRY tragedy lies in the fact that all the money that has been received from German compensation, loans from the West, and emigrants’ money were frittered away through corruption, robbery and catastrophic management. The solutions for this problem are retroactive laws, investigations of asset sources and mobile courts that will enforce the law on the ground. In some countries, hands are cut of for theft. In Croatia, every second parliamentary deputy would raise an arm stump when it was time to vote because the hands would no longer there. If naked thieves were pasted with tar and feathers and paraded from Ban Jelacic Square to the Upper Town, through a crowd of people armed with canes and spoiled vegetables, there would be much less Sanaders and Vidosevics. In Croatia, the question of what happened to the property that belonged to SKH (League of Communists of Croatia), SKOJ (League of Communist Youth of Yugoslavia), Unions, SUBNOR (League of United Fighters of The People’s Liberation War) and other socialist organisations was never put when national ownership was transferred into state ownership.

Who rules today over Croatia?

Former SKH (League of Communists of Croatia) and CKJ (Central Committee of Yugoslavia) personnel and their descendants, who have entered into an alliance with careerists, rectal climbers, cultural Marxists and covert neoliberals reign over Croatia. This Trojan horse, under the guise of multiculturalism, humanism and cosmopolitanism advocates mass emigration, disrupts European identity, and carries out the brainwashing with political correctness as its excuse. Croatia is specific in that up to 30% of the population is programmed from childhood to hate the Croatian state pathologically because they started in Yugoslavia. In the former communist countries, Bolshevik Satanism was imposed externally, while in Croatia unfortunately the same domestic product sprung from within. Those cadres have replaced one doctrine for the other. They have traversed the path from Marx to the backside (gender ideology).

In your speeches in the Parliament, you often mention the Croatian emigration. Croatian emigrants have played an important role in the independence of Croatia. On the other hand, we know that a large number of our people left the former state due to political persecution. Why has no significant return to democratic Croatia been recorded?

A systematic sabotage program has been implemented against the Croatian diaspora! The remains of socialist bureaucracy, inefficient public administration and ubiquitous corruption are just symptoms of deliberate and organised sabotage that prevents the return of Croatian emigration. The old Yugo-structures fear the knowledge, money power, and above all, the patriotism that Croatians living outside of Croatia possess. While other countries like Israel have integrated their diaspora into its legal and economic order Croats outside the homeland must fly for hours to even vote when elections are on. Without the contribution of the Croatian diaspora, the outcome of the Homeland War would have been questionable. Croatian emigration not only armed Croatian forces (HV & HVO) but gave six Croatian generals plus a host of other soldiers. Today, a minimum of 16.5 billion kunas per year comes to Croatia via bank accounts. But, surely, just as much comes through direct visits to Croatia, which cash flow is not recorded through the European Central Bank or Croatian National Bank. A new citizenship law is being drafted, which should go to the parliamentary procedure by October 2019. I know it’s late but better late than never.

Why are there no significant investments into the Croatian economy by Croatian emigrants?

Every investment seeks economic and political stability, but above all legal safety. Legal and military doctrines cannot be mixed. We cannot expect people from the former system to change their mindset and the way of doing business when that’s mostly based on thievery. Let’s remember one of the mantras of the failed self-managing anarchy: “If we can not do otherwise we will be honest” or “Bribe into car boot long live Tito.” This was not bad either: “We pretend to work, they pretend to pay us”. Every investor who has made his capital in a real economy somewhere in the world, in the first steps of establishing his company in Croatia, will notice that Croatia is far from Real economy.

Do you have a plan that would encourage the migrants to return and invest?

Yes, coup d’etat to save people – a little joke, our biggest problems are internal, not external! First, we must create an efficient system and professionalise staff in public administration. For that, nationally conscious people are needed, not lizards that change colours as needed and whose mental set has remained on the other side of the Berlin Wall. Another precondition is the reform of the legal system and speedy implementation of the law. That’s where there is a big problem because majority of staff in Croatian institutions come from the former system. If you’re inclined to respecting the legislation you must first respect the legislator. It’s difficult to have respect for a judge who sentenced someone to two years in prison just because that someone told jokes about a locksmith’s assistant (Tito) or about Milka Planinc.

Croatia is an EU member. Are you satisfied with the status of Croatia in the EU and what is your view of the future of the EU?

The Ministry of Regional Development and European Funds has announced that since the entry into the EU in 2013, Croatia is about HRK 14.5 billion in the plus, and we have already mentioned that more than double of that sum arrives from the Croatian Emigration direction. As you know, every foreign investor expects more than he invested after the investment, and the Croatian emigration invests money without such expectations and thus de facto contributes to the Croatian budget. It is precisely in this statistic that a total failure of Croatian economic policy is seen. It is also obvious that Croatia is actively implementing Brussels legislative regulations and ignores resolutions, such as Resolution 1481, which advocates decommunisation (lustration). After all, the EU is primarily a financial union that is now in the middle of a trade war between China and the United States. The next global financial crisis can shake the foundation of the EU more than the current BREXIT. With the exit of Great Britain from EU, Germany takes on the highest proportion of costs for incoming migrants, let us not forget that the German economy is based on car industry – what if the car industry known to us today undergoes restructuring and change? And we see that the German government itself is undermining its largest industrial branch so that by force and with the help of neoliberal structures and parties (Greens, Social Democratic Party SPD, Christian Democratic Union CDU, Friday for Future, mainstream media and the like) it attempts the impossible – overnight swap internal combustion car engines with battery run cars. Due to BREXIT, some countries will also lose a large part of incentives for agriculture, including Romania and Bulgaria. Most of the burden will be borne by Germany. How long can Germany resist this pressure from uncontrolled imports of unregistered migrants on the one hand and the economic burden through the EU on the other? Only Turkey receives 3.5 billion euros a year for the management of refugees, whom it uses as a lever to enforce diplomatic pressure upon the EU. The EU can survive as a financial union but if it interferes with the internal politics of a member state or attempts to impose its ideology and worldview – it will not survive as a loose federation of unequal states. I ask you what are the universal values that Brussels imposes upon us in the form of gender ideology, false multiculturalism and cultural Marxism? You can answer this question, yourself.

The Andrej Plenkovic government is advocating for EU enlargement to the Western Balkans, ie Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). How do you look upon this plan for further expansion?

We are far from EU enlargement! When it comes to Serbia, we must first resolve border issues, war compensation and above all the return of our missing. True catharsis also requires the protection of the Croatian minority in Vojvodina and Serbia. Today, we pay tens of thousands of pensions to those who had occupied Croatia and committed aggression against the Croatian people. Has anyone asked what is the pension of an average Croat in Subotica? How many Croats are there in the Belgrade Assembly? It is necessary to seek reciprocity (equalisation) when it comes to minority rights. Croatia must be fully engaged to protect the constitutional rights of the Croatian people in BiH. I have repeatedly said that without the four HVO (Croatian Defence Council) operational zones there would be neither Federation of BIH nor Croatian state within the present borders, as we know them today. Croatia is today in a plus 100m euros when it comes to trading of goods between Croats of Herceg Bosna and the Croatian homeland – as the song by Mark Perkovic Thompson says “One soul, and two of us”. All is said in that sentence.

The Croatian people in BiH are constituent, but we see Bosniaks electing political representatives of the Croatian people. How to solve this problem?

After all that our brothers in BiH went through, it is shameful that they are still victims of political engineering supported by the international community. (Zeljko)Komsic is a personification of political perversion. He was and remains mentally – a Yugoslav. A mere amendment to the electoral law will not ensure the survival of Croats in BiH. A layered plan and program that involves lobbying on a geostrategic level, the development of macroeconomic policies and the stimulation of Croatian cultural institutions is needed. All of the above is hampered by political instability, corruption and lack of functional institutions at all levels. We cannot predict what will happen in the near future, but it is important that Croats do not sell their land and resolve property-legal relations. Over the next 10 years, water and fertile land will become the most important strategic resource. We need to understand that BiH is on the windy side of geopolitical interests that often diverge from the Croatian ones. To solve the problem of BiH, Solomon’s wisdom and unlimited financial resources are needed.

Do you think that Croatia should have stronger ties to the Visegrad group?

From the cultural perspective our place is in Central Europe with Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia etc. and even Italy is trying to join the Visegrad group and even if it is geographically far away from Central Europa, our place is definitely not on the Balkan gorges with the Cincaric tribes where renaissance lights never broke through. We have another trump card in this group; in comparison to other countries in the Visegrad group our geostrategic position is more favourable when it comes to energy and trade policy. We have to use it as a sovereign state. I would also emphasise that the peoples of Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland share common values about the family, God, sovereignty and opposition to immigration, and that they can interpret Europe from a “common dictionary”. There is a great potential for cooperation between the Visegrad Group countries, particularly in the traffic sector. Visegrad group countries represent a market that brings together 64 million people. They represent a great potential for the Croatian economy. Croatia’s geopolitical position, as a link between South East Europe and the Adriatic, makes Croatia attractive to these countries and I stress out that even three European corridors pass through Croatia. The total trade of Croatia and the Visegrad group countries last year amounted to 3.6 billion euros or 12 percent of Croatia’s total foreign trade. Croatia exported to Visegrad group countries – Hungary, Slovakia, Czech and Poland, 917 million euros worth of goods and services and imported 2.7 billion euros worth of goods from these countries. From 1993 to the end of 2015, investors from these countries invested EUR 2.7 billion in Croatia, which is 9 percent of total foreign direct investment in Croatia, while at the same time Croatia invested EUR 204 million in those countries. As a significant link to the V4 group, tourism was highlighted, pointing out that 17% of the total number of tourists visiting Croatia came from Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. Croatia as the most recent member of the EU can learn much from the states of the Visegrad Group on the use of money from EU funds and that, apart from large infrastructure projects, there is a great interest of small and medium-sized entrepreneurs for cooperation. We must not ignore all the above, but we must strengthen cooperation at all levels.

Do you think our tourism this year will be more successful than last year’s?

We do not have a crystal ball to predict the future, but all the indications point to the fact that the competitive countries have been doing much more in the field of marketing, promotion and different deals than Croatia. The tourist season this year will not be as successful as in a couple of previous seasons. In fact, the past season has already shown a decline when Turkey initiated its state intervention measures for tourism by subsidising whole arrangements by up to 50%, which caused the prices to fall. Given that this information was fairly accessible, the Minister for tourism and his associates must have known it and should have responded adequately to it. This year the situation is even worse since Turkey, panicking for inflation, has decided upon an ambitious move to subsidise flights to Antalya, which will affect a range of tourists visiting their most famous seaside resort. Croatians in the diaspora (mostly in Germany) watch television spots from Turkey, Greece, Spain and other tourist communities on all television, cinema and video platforms in the break between movie blockbusters, starting with New Year’s Eve. Why? These countries analysed the German market and found that German tourists with school age children had to decide upon their annual leave days in advance and so they adjusted their marketing campaigns to this target group. Croatia has opted for a shorter promotional period, but even in that narrower manoeuvring space it is in a subordinate position – the ambitious video ‘Croatia Full Of Life’ is broadcast after promotional videos of its direct competition, with less frequency. It is as if someone wants one of the last Croatian economic branches that brings fresh capital into the economic system to be brought to its knees for the long haul? Such an outdated system is threatened with a collapse. Croatia has in such a way lost even the little amount of global competitiveness it had, and the systems fall like card towers – in the end, not even fifty tiers will help our pension system, and every worker will find happiness in some other more stable and less corrupt surroundings. Another important question is how such investments are worthwhile for the Turks? The city of Antalya consists of greenhouses that in over 40% of the city’s surface are used for growing all types of food, thus finding the shortest path to the end consumer – in this case a satisfied guest sunbathing on its beaches. There is no imported garbage from the EU, no customs duty, and the Turkish peasant lives and prospers from his own job – employs his fellow countrymen who are no longer dependent upon the state, and the state in turn invests a huge freed-up budget for the promotion of Turkish tourism. Another reason why, in a wider economic calculation, it pays off for Turkey to subsidise entire arrangements and flights. The German Croat engages in tourism in Croatia and is struggling with the mystery why a large part of the market with 85 million people in Germany rushes to Turkey. He finds the answer in the aforementioned subsidies and now he is interested in where the profitability of Erdogan’s (non) profitable move is. He decides upon the best option to choose – a personally checked out, and a two-week luxury package with the All Inclusive tag for 1800 euros. The route includes – a train from Stuttgart to Düsseldorf, a return flight from Düsseldorf to Turkey, day-long possibility for consumption of local domestic food, beverages including freshly squeezed juices, unlimited alcohol consumption, exclusive daily events in the festival crowd with accompanying content, sports offer (gym, sauna, horseback riding, spinning, Aqua-Gym, aerobics at various locations, archery, yoga, boxing, tennis, beach volleyball, soccer…) etc. and all that in one tourist resort . The luggage was a handheld handbag for hygiene – everything else including a large bag for his return was purchased in Turkey at a cheaper price and superior product quality. In the end he spent an additional 1900 euros. Maybe it looks a lot for Croatian opportunities, but for the German, for the above amount, he got three suits, a leather and season jacket, several pairs of jeans, shorts and t-shirts, underwear, socks, suitcase… Practically the attire for all the seasons. With a “Made In Turkey” label. These are only two reasons why and how Erdogan can give out such subsidies. Long-term thinking, smart state intervention and strategic closure of the economic circle within our own economic system to our “experts” seem like unthinkable science fiction.

How do you look upon the situation when a part of the Croatian youth listens to the so-called Turbofolk?

All our evils came from the east, from Mongolia to the Turbofolk. This noise pollution throws us back to the gorges of the Balkans. Turbofolk is the music of what Trabant Warburg was to the car industry. I personally, and many others, when hearing that nasty screaming, would rather pull on an AK-47. If you want to interrogate prisoners of war, just play a Mile Kitic, and all the secrets of their armed forces will immediately pour out. I do not know why young people in puberty subject themselves to this masochism but the combination of Turbofolk and alcohol leads to a state of active psychosis. You do not need cocaine or ecstasy to become a living legend in your own mind and to your own self. The young drunken fool becomes an old drunken fool.

Can you describe to us your arrival in ‘91 from the diaspora to defend the Croatian Homeland, it will be interesting for everyone and especially young people to hear something privately personal about one of our heroes.

My brother and I were born in Zagreb, our family has been in Zagreb since 1928. My grandfather had finished classical grammar school and was always politically engaged. After WWII all our property was taken away for political reasons. Our grandfather got 10 years in prison in Zenica and after leaving the prison he was given 5 years of civil rights denial, which meant he could not work or build, with him, the whole family was excluded from social life. My father fled in 1954 because the authorities wanted to conscript him into the Yugoslav Army, which was definitely not his army and that was when my twin brother and I were 6 months old. He graduated from the Music Academy in Rome. Grandfather managed to flee in his third attempt in 1958 and after two years in a refugee camp in Italy he arrived in Canada. He brought us over in 1962. I worked with the Court Justice in Canada. After a trip, I and my friend, who was with me in the Canadian Army, joined the Foreign Legion for a bet. Having completed the training and after the return of our unit from the Gulf War in April 1991 the war in Slovenia began. I knew what would happen because the tyrannies do not improve but, unfortunately, are torn down with the force of arms. I came to Croatia in the second month after returning to France and joined the ZNG (Bojna Zrinski) (Croatian National Guard/Zrinski battalion). I was on the Lika battlefield and the southern battlefield until the international recognition of the Republic of Croatia, I spent the rest of my military career in BiH, literally from the first to the last bullet. In our family there was a very pronounced affiliation to Croatian identity and the Croatian people. In Canada, a cross, the verses of the Croatian hymn and the image of a consistent charge by Nikola Zrinski against the enemy conqueror hung on the walls. After our mother’s death, we found her letter addressed to my brother and me in which she emphasised that she was proud of us for continuing in the tradition of our family in defending Croatia’s Homeland and for participating in the centuries-old dream of the Croatian people, which is the creation of the Croatian Homeland. People live in the world of false perception in which porn pessimists prevail in mainstream media; they hold people in political and historical darkness so that we get a distorted picture of the present. Living has never been better or longer in human history, but sadly, man is now reduced to the level of an animal in which everything is evaluated on the basis of materialism. The West has lost the moral compass and today it is in a spiritual and moral crisis. If I have learned anything in life, it is to never give up on life’s struggle no matter how hard that struggle may be. Unfortunately, children suffering from terminal illness have more moral courage and spirituality than most people who go through life complaining about their destiny, like not having the newest intelligent cell phone that intelligently captures and binds them. I would like to leave a message for the young people to keep to their family and to the Homeland if they are in a position to do so, because they will always find strength in them in moments of sadness and suffering.

EU, Croatia and Brexit

Croatia and Brexit

 

The European Union has seen numerous crises come and go and some staying stubbornly put – e.g. last year’s rejection by many member states to take in EU-stipulated quotas of refugees/migrants, but the 23 June 2016 Brexit vote in the United Kingdom has perhaps forced upon the EU the biggest crisis yet – bigger than was possible to imagine, perhaps? Brexit vote had within days of its results count heralded far-reaching consequences not only for the UK and the EU, but also for the countries seeking EU membership from the Balkans, Turkey etc.

Never before have citizens of an EU member state voted against remaining part of the Union and after more than four decades of its existence the problems of untangling many matters and connections within the EU network of member states are emerging as almost impossible to solve without causing serious damage to one or the other side and to individual people from both sides. By June 2016 UK had grown into and fused with EU flesh and the future of separating that EU flesh appears to entail serious repercussions for all involved.

Prior to Brexit vote the EU has been THE club to join particularly because of UK being its member. UK had been a draw-card for many from Eastern and Southeast Europe to vote “Yes” to EU membership at their own referendums. Arguably, many people from all countries of Eastern Europe and Southeast, such as Croatia in 2013, had held EU membership as an ideal club to aspire to precisely because UK was there, waiting in its desired modernity to embrace them as its own and lobbying for EU expansion. Now that Brexit vote assures UK’s departure from the EU these multitudes of people in these countries are bound to be asking themselves if it was worthwhile for their country to join the EU after all. The repercussions of Brexit vote will remain unclear for many weeks and months to come, as the implications are far reaching. Much will depend on decisions taken by British and EU leaders on a number of issues that will extend beyond the Brexit itself.

The EU, without the UK, is likely to see strengthened campaigns for it to become a union of sovereign states, rather than a federation of nation states that Brussels wants at this stage. Following Eastern European countries’ (e.g. Hungary, Slovakia, Poland…) stance in rejecting the housing of refugees and illegal migrants and in protecting their borders and the ever increasing height of the “national interests” (which by the way was at its highest in Wales and England, in particular, at the time of Brexit vote) suggest that the push for union of sovereign states is about to get heartier in EU.

dr Franjo Tudjman at UN on 22 May 1992

dr Franjo Tudjman at UN on 22 May 1992

A quarter century after Croatia declared its independence from Yugoslavia, British voters have decided, albeit by a narrow margin, to leave the European Union. Throughout various media outlets in Croatia, Croats are currently pulling out of drawers president Franjo Tudjman’s words, even as far back as 1968 when as scientist and historian he wrote that “the European community in the shape of a union between European states could represent the most advantageous framework for a true revitalisation of the idea of co-existence in today’s world”.

European politics can only be purposeful if it brings about the creation of such a European community which will have the capacity of free itself from intolerable tutelage under both super powers (USA and USSR) and become an independent actor within the international life. Such a community in Europe can only be achieved as a union of states of independent European nations who would retain their own national quintessence, the right independent socio-political development within their own borders and to sovereignty in international life. The fundamental European politics that aim towards European community joining its European people’s material and intellectual powers into the idea of active co-existence and unity of diversity are the only politics that have real prospects of success,” wrote Franjo Tudjman way back in 1969 and retained these opinions as to the dynamics and make up of the European community/union well into the 1990’s when he championed Croatia’s independence from communist Yugoslavia.

The largest political party, Croatian Democratic Union/HDZ, is currently preparing for its own leadership elections since Tomislav Karamarko resigned as leader last month; and, in the aftermath of the recent fall of government, snap general elections are due mid-September. Croatian political analysts and journalists are already asking the question: which leader of which party is likely to support an EU Federation of Nation States centrally governed from Brussels and which leader is likely to support an EU as Union of Sovereign States.

European Union is currently shaking from the rubbing of two tectonic plates against each other: the Euro-federalist one and the Euro-sovereignty one. Germany’s Angela Merkel and Brussels’ corridors of power are championing the former while the latter is strongly the agenda of Eastern Europe’s countries particularly the Visegrad Group (Czech, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia) to which Croatia has been aspiring for a while, at least since Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic’s presidency took power in January 2015. Traces of leanings to a union of sovereign states in EU, or leaving the EU if membership means stripping of national sovereignty of state, can also be seen in Austria’s and Greece’s recent speculations as to a possible exit from the EU; Italy’s, Netherland’s and France’s conservatives increasing anti-EU sentiments and so forth…

 

The likely candidate for Croatia’s HDZ leadership elections in July, EUP Andrej Plenkovic, appears to support the EU Federation option and hence, the Visegrad Group lobby for a union of sovereign states would pose a problem for Croatia and lingering divisions and dissent. One cannot sit on both stools at the same time, as it were. It’s hard to imagine that majority Croats would want the European super state of federation where government is centralised in Brussels and sovereignty of each state erased as seems to be what Plenkovic as HDZ leader might support. It’s been said that such may be the case because EU protects its smaller member states but not all agree with such a view. While attaching oneself to a bigger and wealthier body might provide certain securities it certainly risks losing ones identity or much of it.

 

The remaining EU 27 members have been seeking a quick resolution, asking the UK to trigger Article 50 of the EU treaty that would manage the process of leaving the EU. However, the British government has been reluctant to trigger this ‘clean’ way out. Indeed with Prime Minister David Cameron resigning, with leaders of the Brexit campaign – Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage – leaving the Brexit train, not only does there seem to be no exit plan but also Brexit supporters are left holding the baby, looking down a “what now” abyss.

 

This puts the union in a state of uncertainty and Germany seemingly stepping up into the lobby for enlargement role UK played before – as exemplified by Angela Merkel’s swift statement on 4 July 2016 that Serbia may open its EU membership negotiation on Chapters 23 and 24 and that Croatia had agreed to this. Croatia had been stalling Serbia’s progress in opening Chapter 23 for EU membership negotiations with view to several important legal and judicial issues and missing persons matters outstanding from the 1990’s war against Croatia. The fact that these were issues to clear before Serbia is given a green light for Chapter 23 negotiations, and that green light to Serbia has now been given without adequate explanations in public as to what happened with Croatia’s issues, leaves one asking many distressing questions, particularly regarding justice for victims of Serb crimes in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. A logical and obvious explanation here is that the EU is working very hard to show the world that Brexit will not stop EU enlargement! However, the cost of such moves as opposed to the cost of nurturing the existing EU member states and leaving enlargement for a later time, could well prove to be too high for EU’s ambitions for the creation of a superstate of itself; member states may retaliate against such centralist decision-making as are those demonstrated this week regarding Serbia’s negotiations for EU membership. I mean, every “Tom, Dick and Harry” stood in Croatia’s way to negotiate its membership over many years and now, only three years after it achieved membership, the EU seems to have parked its criteria at an open town-market where EU membership desirous states can barter their way into membership whichever way and with whatever they want. So much for reasonable and needed criteria that guarantees at least some grassroots homogeneity in EU!

Whether Croats will fall into a position from which they’ll be happy to blindly and mutely listen to everything that comes out Brussels is the most burning question now. This week’s events that gave Serbia green light to open negotiations in Chapters 23 and 24 for EU membership have completely omitted to explain to the Croatian public why that is so and what happened with the issues of protests or requirements Croatia had put before the EU in this regard. I do not believe the Croatian public will wear this lightly and will want explanations. The wounds of the 1990’s War of Independence are still very raw, sacrifices made for freedom and sovereignty and self-determination – still felt heavily and deeply. No politician in Croatia is likely to survive for very long if he/she forgets this fact. EU or no EU. Ina Vukic, Prof. (Zgb); B.A., M.A.Ps. (Syd)

Croatian President Boosting Prospects For EU Independence From Russian Energy Supplies

First Meeting in New York of Adriatic-Baltic-BlackSea Group initiated by Croatia's President 29 September 2015 Photo: predsjednica,hr

First Meeting in New York
of Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group
initiated by Croatia’s President
29 September 2015
Photo: predsjednica,hr

 

While the hopeless, destructive, narcissistic and redder than red Croatia’s Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic said maliciously, commenting on President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic’s attendance of the 70th session of the UN General Assembly in late September 2015, that he had “better things to do than go shopping in New York”, Croatia’s President Grabar-Kitarovic was hosting the activation into practice of her initiative and idea for the Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea cooperation. The first meeting (convened on the side-lines of the 70th session of the UN General Assembly held at the UN in New York on 29 September 2015) of the Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea cooperation forged with the participation of 12 countries at the initiative of Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic decided to maintain this form of cooperation and to hold their next meeting in Zagreb in 2016. The group, comprising of Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland and Romania would seem ideally positioned to strategically and effectively shake the rug under the Russian control of gas energy supplies in particular as well as being an ideal circle of states that can bash out the negative and economic progress-stifling remnants of the former communist regimes in that part of the world. It’s important to note that this group is not a new formal political organisation, though, but a frame within which the already existing avenues and networks of cooperation will be channeled in a more focused and concentrated manner in order to achieve the most effective outcomes for the three areas of concern.

Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group countries map

Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group
countries map

The meeting in New York resolved to focus on three areas – energy, transport and telecommunications – and create/develop a Central-European region’s north-south-bound infrastructure in these fields of energy, transport and digital communication, through joint action for the acquisition of EU funds and talks.
Furthermore and with regards to the suffocating refugee crisis Europe is currently hit by and politically buckling under, the meeting reached a palpable consensus to pursue the line which insists that Europe alone cannot be solely responsible to solve the crisis but that it is a global matter and call for a global response.

Croatia's President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic hosting the 29 September 2015 Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group meeting at UN

Croatia’s President
Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic
hosting the 29 September 2015
Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group meeting at UN

The Baltic states can set a perfect example for the Adriatic and Black Sea regions of how to strengthen regional cooperation and create a common market in the context of economic and administrative reforms,” said the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania Linas Linkevicius. According to the head of the Lithuanian diplomacy, the Adriatic, Baltic and Black Sea regions have many opportunities to deepen their political cooperation and to coordinate actions more closely, in particular in the fields of energy and transport: exchanging experiences in diversifying energy supplies, creating an integrated European energy market and more actively developing the North-South Transport Corridor.

Croatian President at Visegrad V4 2015
On 8th/9th October 2015 Croatia’s president Grabar-Kitarovic attended in Belatonfured, Hungary, as special guest the meeting of the heads of states of the Visegrad V4 Group (The Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia). Topics discussed at this high-level meeting included migration, climate change, energy, security and stability in the South-East Europe area. President Grabar-Kitarovic emphasised that the acceptance of linked goals in sustainable development from the climate change agenda achieved in New York for the post-2015 period was a significant step forward. She said that energy-related connections between the countries in the Group was mutually beneficial and that energy efficiency and energy independence were important elements of national security and political stability of every country, its economy and its citizens’ standard of living.
With the building of the LNG terminal on the Island of Krk and our linking with the Visegrad group countries, but also within the framework of the Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea initiative, which I have recently presented, we would secure not only the energy independence for our countries but also the political and economic ones and thus shield our countries from possible manipulations such as the closures of gas supplies or the manipulation with pricing,” stated Grabar-Kitarovic.
Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region in 2014 accelerated and underscored the need for the EU to do more to safeguard energy supply to Europe, which relies on Russia for about a third of its gas, almost half of which is piped via Ukraine. Under the European Commission initiative on Central, Eastern and South-Eastern European Gas Connectivity (CESEC), the countries will also focus on making the best use of existing infrastructure by allowing reverse flows. Projects, such as the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), which is set to bring gas from Azerbaijan to Europe, an LNG terminal on island of Krk, Croatia, and system reinforcement in Bulgaria and Romania, have been identified as top priorities.
LNG Croatia has extended its deadline to year-end for bid submissions from equity investors to build its import terminal on Krk Island. The company has extended the deadline from December 15 to December 31, “in agreement with the European Commission at the request of companies for which the LNG business is not a primary one”.
LNG Croatia’s planned €600 million, 1.6-2.4 million tonne a year LNG terminal has been designated a strategic investment project, supplying gas to EU member states in the Central Eastern Europe, South Eastern Europe and beyond, to reduce reliance on piped Russian gas. LNG Croatia plans to start construction next summer, for completion in 2019.

UN, New York, 29 September 2015 First meeting of Adriatic Baltic Black Sea Group hosted by Croatia's President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic

UN, New York, 29 September 2015
First meeting of
Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group
hosted by Croatia’s President
Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic

It has been said over and over again that it is unlikely Europe could significantly reduce its overall dependence on Russian gas any time before 2030 for both existing contractual and supply/demand reasons. While contracts are legally binding the latter is particularly an interesting aspect of this unhappy relationship defined by dependency, alternative sources for gas can be developed particularly for countries in the Baltic region, Central East Europe and Central South Europe that are wholly or heavily dependent on Russian gas. Europe has spent years trying to wriggle free from its dependence on Russian energy and the whims of its volatile president, Vladimir Putin. So, having in mind the Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group developments one needs to ask why is the continent considering signing up for a new gas pipeline that will keep Europe hostage to Russian energy shenanigans and outright blackmail for decades to come? The agreement revealed at the beginning of September 2015 between Russia’s Gazprom PJSC and European companies including Royal Dutch Shell Plc, EON AG and Engie to expand the Nord Stream pipeline under the Baltic Sea (designed to shift gas into Western Europe), completely neglects and defies the interests of Eastern Europe and in particular the fact that Poland and Slovak leaders have called this deal a betrayal to European unity! Russia’s multi-billion-dollar plans to expand the capacity of the existing Nord Stream pipeline across the Baltic Sea to Germany seem to be taking shape faster than most observers expected — and stand in stark contrast to the bevy of other stillborn energy projects Russia keeps announcing. In conclusion, it seems clear that there is a front of western companies willing to push forward the expansion of the pipeline connecting Russia with Germany, while politicians and companies from Eastern Europe are ready to equally table their requests and a push for locating new sources of gas within the EU geographical span. The interests of Western and Eastern European blocks are clearly diverging. If not carefully handled, that could be a problem, especially in a moment where migrations and complex geopolitical moves seem to already be fracturing Europe. The Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group initiative seems to have given the Eastern European block new stronger wings in the pursuit of achieving independence from Russian gas supplies and may indeed be a factor that will help slow down if not thwart Nord Stream 2 project and turn the European companies into exploring new sources of gas on the continent rather than tightening ties with Russia. Of course, it all depends how strong the political resolve is in the EU to actually phase out its dependence on Russian gas. If the resolve is high and real we will perhaps see more LNG terminals across Europe mushroom, lifting up local economies in the process.

Possible Gas Pipelines from Krk Island LNG Terminal Croatia

Possible Gas Pipelines from
Krk Island LNG Terminal
Croatia

The pathway to reducing or phasing out dependence on Russian gas is precisely dotted with new LNG terminals and pipeline connections and the Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic has scored an enormously positive mark in this by initiating the Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea Group. And yes, she did go shopping in New York: shopping for stronger cooperation between countries affected by energy dependence on Russia. No wonder Croatia’s Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic – a die-hard communist idealist who keeps his government’s sights fixated at mollycoddling Russia rather than looking more Westward – didn’t like the President’s latest visit to New York! Perhaps Croatia will score an even more positive mark in the upcoming general elections on 8 November and vote the incompetent Social Democrats out of government. Ina Vukic, Prof. (Zgb); B.A., M.A.Ps. (Syd)

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