Croatia Urges Serbia to Secure Croatian Minority’s Rights

BETAPHOTO/EMIL VAS/DS

The Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of Croatia has protested the decision of the City of Subotica for children in a kindergarten in Tavankut, built with Croatian funding, to be tutored in the Serbian language and urged Serbia to prevent discriminatory practices against the Croatian minority, the Hina agency learned from diplomatic sources on Nov. 5.

At the end of October, the City Assembly of Subotica adopted a decision on the network of pre-school institutions, envisaging that tutoring in the Guardian Angels kindergarten in Tavankut is delivered in the Serbian and Croatian languages, instead of in Croatian only, as was decided in 2023. According to Hina, Croatian Foreign Minister Gordan Grlic Radman announced last week the sending of a protest note because of this.

In the protest note, the Ministry expressed serious concern over the approach to and treatment of the Croatian national minority by the local and state bodies in Serbia, Hina was told by the sources. They further expressed concern over the fact that the start of work of the kindergarten in Tavankut was conditioned by a demand for a bi-lingual program, which has not been the case in other communities so far. 

The Ministry expressed suspicion that administrative reasons were being used “for political purposes and the conditioning of the Croatian community’s rights,” adding that this represented discrimination against the Croatian national minority. For that reason, the Ministry urged Serbia and its institutions to secure the conditions for the full and unobstructed exercising of rights by the Croatian national minority in the country, guaranteed by the multilateral and bilateral agreements, and to undertake measures to prevent discriminatory practices against the Croats in Serbia “at all levels and in all situations.”