PRIME Minister Andrej Plenkovic said on Sunday he would go to Varivode at the end of September to pay his respects to the victims killed there in the Homeland War.

Speaking to the press in Sinj ahead of the 305th Sinjska Alka tournament, he commented on Independent Democratic Serb Party (SDSS) president Milorad Pupovac's statement that he would attend this year's commemoration for war victims in Skabrnja.

Plenkovic said representatives of the Serb minority were part of the parliamentary majority and that this was extremely good and natural as well as normal that the Deputy PM from the SDSS, Boris Milosevic, attended this year's anniversary of Operation Storm.

Plenkovic said the messages that were sent at that anniversary were appropriate for the start of a new phase in the relations between the Croatian people and the Serb minority.

"In that way, we are sending a signal about an inclusive and tolerant society, a society which knows what reconciliation is and what a common future is. In line with that, I think it's good that Mr Milorad Pupovac, as the leader of the SDSS, is going to Skabrnja. These are all gestures and hounouring the victims as they deserve."

Belgrade still needs time to understand what is being done in Croatia

Asked to comment on Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic's statements about Milosevic's attending the Operation Storm anniversary, Plenkovic said that everything the government was doing was for the sake of Croatia, Croatian society, and the relations between Croats and the Serb minority.

He said Belgrade still needed time to fully understand what the Croatian government was doing, what it was interested in and what it would insist on in talks with Serbia.

That is the protection of Croats' rights as a minority in Serbia and the wish that they are adequately represented in government, in line with the 2000 bilateral agreement, he added.

Plenkovic went on to say that the government formed a parliamentary majority with the people it cooperated with in the previous term, a majority which would be compact, homogenous and which would support the government and the bills it sent to parliament. 

"That entails, 25 years after the war, certain new steps and gestures which first and foremost mirror Croatia, which is a confident state which has achieved all its strategic goals, a state which is a member of the EU and NATO and which, with its political moves, can be an example to others. That's what guides us."

Asked to comment on Pupovac's statement that international factors should get involved in the reconciliation process, Plenkovic said he did not know whom he meant and that the government talked only with representatives of the SDSS.

Tourism's contribution to economy

Plenkovic went on to say that the government would reconvene on August 20 after the summer break.

We should be satisfied with how we have responded to COVID-19 and the restrictions when the virus was at its deadliest, and later with the opening which has made this tourism season's results quite good, he said.

"We should continue in line with that, so that August is as successful as possible, so that the contribution of Croatian tourism is another boost to the Croatian economy, and we will start working on a recovery programme. That's our framework document, which will be the basis for absorbing funds from the Next Generation instrument, from which we have received €8.4 billion."