The matter of the Osimo and Rome treaties is no longer a political dispute, and the relations between Croatia and Italy have reached the level at which the matter of Italy taking over compensation under the Treaty of Osimo will be very soon carried out, Croatia's President Ivo Josipovic said in an interview which the Rijeka-based Novi List published on Saturday.
After Italian President Giorgio Napolitano's visit to Zagreb this July, President Josipovic said that Italy had finally acceded to Croatia's payment of EUR 35 million euros as compensation stipulated by the 1975 Treaty of Osimo.
The payment has not yet been carried out," Josipovic said in response to the newspaper's question.
"However, I do not doubt that our relations have reached the level when this problem can be solved swiftly. Indeed, is there any reason to doubt the words of our proven friend President Napolitano," the Croatian head of state added.
The presidents of Croatia and of Italy will attend the "Croatia and Italy Together in Europe" concert in the Roman amphitheatre in the northern Adriatic city of Pula on Saturday evening. Before the concert, the two presidents will meet with associations of the esuli, representatives of the Croatian Antifascists Alliance and representatives of the Italian community in Istria. Before the concert, Josipovic and Napolitano will also issue a joint statement on controversial issues from the past and the common future of Croatia and Italy in united Europe.
Josipovic said in the interview that the "money in the problematic framework" of the Osimo and Roma treaties was not the most important. "Therefore, Italy refused to accept the money which Croatia and Slovenia offered, and before that Yugoslavia. However, there are agreements that are legally valid and commit all parties. Politically, none of the countries questions their enforcement. I would say that to date some political, and if you want, civilisation conditions have not been met for the finalisation of the stipulated financial arrangements," the Croatian president said.
Now when the Croatians, the Slovenians and the Italians, as protagonists of historical disputes, shed their ideological ballast, it is easier to look at the past end see that the evil is the evil, Josipovic said.
Evil has no nationality and evil should be deplored, he added.
We must mutually admit that the others have the right to remember the sufferings of victims and losses and that they have the right to grief and reverence, Josipovic said adding that he and his Italian counterpart are working on "freeing the contemporary relations from the burden of the past".
