Eideard

European Union leaders gave the go-ahead on Friday for Croatia to join the EU, after six years of preparations marred by slow democratic reforms in Zagreb and the EU’s reluctance to expand.

The former Yugoslav state of 4.4 million people should be able to wrap up accession negotiations next week, they said at a summit in Brussels, but warned the Zagreb government that it has to continue to fight widespread corruption with “vigor.”

The recommendation marks a turnaround for Croatia, which struggled for years to convince the EU’s 27 governments that its judiciary reforms would produce genuine results and prove it has recognized its role in the Balkan wars in the 1990s…

Several EU governments, led by Britain and the Netherlands, pushed for strict monitoring of Croatia during the ratification process and had insisted that the completion of talks remains open-ended.

But others wanted a more clear message. Many EU politicians are hopeful that rewarding Croatia for a last-minute reform push will persuade other governments in the western Balkans that the EU is willing to accept new members if they are ready…

EU enlargement is likely to remain on the backburner in the coming years, however, with voters around the continent wary of its cost at a time of economic austerity…

Croatia, the richest of EU hopefuls in the Balkans and which relies heavily on tourism, is hoping that accession will bolster its appeal to foreign funds at a time when Europe’s financial woes have slashed direct investment in the region.

Not until they change out the tablecloth-looking football kit.

Vets who saved a female stork, shot by hunters in Croatia, thought her days were numbered – but reckoned without the devotion of her mate.

The vets knew the female, which they called Malena, would never fly again but put her back on her nest thinking she would not survive the winter.

When her partner, named Rodan, flew south with their young they expected that she would eventually die and certainly never mate again.

But their predictions were proved wrong after the Vokic family where she had a nest helped to feed her through the long winter months and she survived.

And – even more amazingly – Rodan has returned every year to mate with his partner and rear another clutch of chicks.

Every year Rodan flies 13,000 kilometres to South Africa to spend winter in the warm and then the same distance back again to be back with his injured love.

I always find these tales interesting, though I can’t speak to storks. Squirrels I can speak to.

Croatian police have detained and questioned Web activists who are criticizing or ridiculing the government, media and the opposition say, accusing authorities of violating basic civil rights.

Police have detained organizers of a group on Facebook, the online social networking site, which called an anti-government rally in several towns, including the capital Zagreb, for December 5. The group has over 80,000 members…

Within a few years, the Internet has become the most widespread medium in this small EU candidate country for citizens to vent their discontent with Prime Minister Ivo Sanader’s conservative government.

When Sanader, quoting the global financial crisis, called last month for belt-tightening and a wage freeze and abolished Christmas parties and presents in state institutions and companies, a new group popped up on Facebook. It called itself Sanader Grinch – a reference to the green-faced character from the movie ‘How Grinch Stole Christmas’.

The police first turned on Facebookers last week, after Niksa Klecak, a member of the main opposition party, the Social Democrats, launched a group called “I bet I can find 5,000 Facebookers who dislike Sanader.”

In a matter of days, the group grew to almost 12,000 members compared to 27 members of two groups that support Sanader.

You’ll note in the article the government is using “patriotic” laws against Nazism – to suppress dissent. Sound familiar?

UPDATE: National Police called press conference – apologized, some coppers to be disciplined. Public and political opposition surely helped.

Bosnian Muslim woman praying today at the Potocari Memorial Center near Srebrenica

Radovan Karadzic, a former Bosnian Serb president, is blamed for these and other deaths during a genocidal war that claimed about 100,000 lives. He was captured yesterday in Belgrade, where the so-called “Butcher of Bosnia” had been living under an assumed name and practicing alternative medicine…

The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia welcomed his arrest. “This arrest may be considered another milestone in the development of international law and further fulfillment of the Tribunal’s mandate to bring to justice the most senior persons alleged to be most responsible for war crimes in the Yugoslav conflicts,” the court says in a statement.

Right on!