Croatian President Zoran Milanovic has said he will instruct Croatia’s permanent representative to NATO, Mario Nobilo, to vote against granting Finland and Sweden membership in the alliance unless a new electoral law is passed in Bosnia and Herzegovina that will make it easier for Croatian representatives to be elected to leadership positions in that country. To me, “the Croats in Bosnia are more important than the entire Russian-Finnish border.”

He pointed out that “this step is not against Finland and Sweden, but in the interests of Croatia”, expressing the conviction that work is underway in Bosnia and Herzegovina to “destroy the Croats as a political force”, and that preventing this is in Croatia’s interest.

Milanovic pointed to Turkey’s resistance to granting Finland and Sweden membership in NATO as an example of “a country fighting for its national interests”, explaining that “Turkey will certainly not sit down at the table to discuss the membership of Sweden and Finland, unless it receives what he wants.”

He indicated that he had requested an emergency meeting of the National Security Council on the issue of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but the Council of Ministers did not respond to this request, stressing that the Croatian government did not have “the right to monopolize the development of the state’s foreign policy”, and urged Parliament not to ratify the agreement on the accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO.

The outcome of this internal political conflict is not yet clear, especially since the Croatian Foreign Ministry last week insisted that the country’s representative to NATO would act in accordance with the recommendations of the ministry, and not the head of state.

Finland and Sweden have applied for NATO membership against the background of the ongoing Russian military operation in Ukraine, while Turkey has expressed its opposition to the two countries joining the alliance, accusing them of supporting the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK).