Croatia in NATO

"Following the English alphabet, Croatia's flag flies after the Canadian and before the Czech," was one of the comments that was repeated over and over again in Croatian news programs yesterday. Below is a report from Nova TV. Even if you don't understand Croatian, the flags, anthems and speeches make clear that Croatia is very proud of being a full member of NATO as of yesterday. Croatia's flag was hoisted in Brussels and, in turn, NATO's flag in Zagreb, where many gathered in front of the Ministry of Defense. Looking at the facade of the building, you'll see the EU flag waving too. I don't know if there are any rules concerning the right to fly the EU flag. I guess not, since you can see them all over the country, even though Croatia won't join the club before 2012.

Despite opposition from some Slovene nationalists, Croatia belongs now to the "world's most elite club", as prime minister Sanader once called NATO. Croatia's own elite gathered in the evening in the National Theatre to celebrate the entry with a concert.
Croatian satisfaction with NATO membership is more than understandable. Next time the Serbs, or whoever, attack "our beautiful homeland" (a very normal way of saying in Croatia) American, Turkish, Canadian and Dutch troops will kick in to kick out the enemy. So we hope...
Less understandable is the habit of Croatia's political elite to link NATO membership with EU accession. I heard people saying that "Croatia is now half way" and Sanader even thinks that EU countries will reconsider the Croatian-Slovenian border dispute, to Croatia's advantage of course.
Personally, I don't see why. First, not all EU members are NATO members. More important, not all NATO allies belong to the EU. Turkey is a great example of the latter categorie. Despite old promises about EU membership and unwavering support from the United States, Turkey is not an EU member and maybe will never be one. Although Turkey is a NATO ally since 1952!
As the Croatian-Slovenia border dispute is concerned: Marrti Ahtisaari was tipped as mediator, but he himself says he has never been formally asked to solve the crisis. Asked what his answer would be to a possible request, he said: "Highly unlikely. I am tired of the Balkans".

From ally to enemy: Slovenia (3)

Slovenia had the chance, earlier this week, to literally become Croatia's ally. Or rather, to ratify Croatia's NATO membership so that Croatia could join the club Slovenia is already in. However, instead of easing tensions NATO membership proved to be another source of discontent between the two countries.
Slovenia did ratify the protocol that extends NATO membership to its neighbor, but it hasn't send the necessary documents to Washington yet. Responsible for this delay are two Slovenian groups, The Institute of the 25th of June (a reference to the day in 1991 on which Slovenia declared independence) and the non-parliamentary Party of the Slovenian Nation. These groups were afraid that Croatia's accession to NATO (and the EU) would imply Slovenia's consent with the current, heavily contested Croatian-Slovenian border. To make clear that Slovenia does not accept the Croatian territorial claims, the two groups demanded an explicit statement on this matter from the Slovenian parliament. Without this statement, they would try to organize a referendum on Croatia's NATO membership.
They got their way: "Slovenia's Parliament on Wednesday afternoon adopted a declaration on the protection of the Slovene national interests during the procedure of Croatia's admission into NATO which reads that at the time when Slovenia declared its independence in 1991, it had access to the high seas and that it had control over some other "disputable" points along its border with Croatia."
Case closed? Not really. The Party of the Slovenian Nation insisted that Croatia should withdraw from some territory and dismantle a border crossing that it considers illegal. This demand is not included in the adopted declaration and therefore the Party of the Slovenian Nation will still try to organize a referendum. A referendum will become inevitable if the party collects 40.000 signatures. Slovenian premier Borut Pahor, meanwhile, is doing his best to convince the Party of the Slovenian Nation that a referendum will further damage Slovenian-Croatian relations.
Like with Croatia, Slovenia is largely ignored by the Western media. I don't think we will see another Balkan war, but if you want to understand why Croats and Slovenes turned into political adversaries, you better keep an eye on Slovenia these days.