Slovenia opposition criticises Croatia deal
(LJUBLJANA) - Slovenia's main opposition centre-right party on Sunday opened fire at a government plan to hold a referendum on an arbitration deal with Croatia.
"It is obvious that the government itself has doubts over the deal since the prime minister has backed the idea about an advisory referendum," the Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) said in a statement.
Slovenia and Croatia signed a deal Wednesday allowing international arbitration to resolve a thorny border dispute that arose after the two states declared independence from ex-Yugoslavia in 1991.
Prime Minister Borut Pahor announced Saturday his Social Democrat party (SD) would call a referendum on the deal before parliament ratifies it.
Previously, Pahor had announced he would also ask the country's constitutional court to examine the deal.
The opposition argues that the deal harms Slovenia's interests, and had threatened to call a referendum itself once the ruling coalition ratified it in parliament.
"First a constitutional court ruling, now a referendum. The question is, if they have so many doubts, why did they sign the deal at all?" the opposition SDS said.
But a poll published by daily Delo on Saturday indicated that if a referendum was held, 48.5 percent of citizens would back the deal, with 36.9 against and 14.6 percent undecided.
The agreement, which must be approved by the parliaments of the two countries, will create an arbitration tribunal tasked with finding a binding solution to the dispute.
Slovenia hopes the deal will secure it access to international shipping waters.
On the other hand, Slovenia must refrain from blocking Croatia's EU accession talks and has agreed that arbitration will only begin after Zagreb successfully concludes membership negotiations with the bloc.
Croatia resumed its EU membership talks in October after Slovenia, an EU member since 2004, ended a 10-month block of the negotiations because of the border dispute involving a small piece of land and sea.
Croatia is hoping to become the bloc's 28th member by 2011.
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