The Foreign Affairs Committee of the European Parliament passed here on Wednesday a report, welcoming progress made by Croatia towards EU membership.
The own-initiative report by Hannes Swoboda was passed with 52 votes in favor, none against and one abstention.
It "congratulates the Croatian authorities on the positive results achieved so far, particularly with regard to the number of negotiation chapters which have been opened."
It also urged the Croatian government to "redouble its efforts to meet the benchmarks for the remaining chapters" and to speed up the development of administrative capacity required in order to implement the new legislation."
The report urged the EU Commission to "step up its efforts and increase the resources allocated for preparing, processing and finalizing negotiating material so that the EU can respond rapidly and efficiently to progress made by Croatia in meeting the relevant opening and closing benchmarks."
The committee expressed its hopes that "increased efforts on the part of Croatia and enhanced support by the EU institutions can still lead to the finalization of an accession treaty in time for the European Parliament to take its final decision on the EU-membership of Croatia before the next European elections in June 2009, so as to start the ratification process as early as possible."
The members of the European Parliament expressed their concerns about the further need to improve the judiciary and corruption in Croatia.
They voiced their "regrets over the fact that the Croatian Parliament decided to introduce unilaterally the Ecological and Fishing Protection Zone (ZERP) in the Adriatic, despite the agreement reached with Italy, Slovenia and the European Commission."
Source: Xinhua
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