Government to increase funding for Croats in Serbia

Plenkovic met in Zagreb with the head of the Democratic Alliance of Croats in Vojvodina (DSHV) and member of the Serbian parliament, Tomislav Zigmanov, and the newly-elected president of the Croatian National Council in Serbia, Jasna Vojnic.

Plenkovic 'expressed the readiness of the Croatian government to increase allocations in the coming period for specific projects that are important for the position of the 58,000-strong Croatian community in Serbia and for the protection of Croatian cultural identity' the press release said.

Zigmanov and Vojnic spoke of the dialogue they had begun at the start of last year with senior Serbian officials. They cited the importance of achieving better opportunities for education in the Croatian language and Latin alphabet and the appropriate representation of the Croatian minority in the National Assembly and regional and local legislatures.

They also called for including the Croatian community in EU-funded cross-border projects, the press release said.