Mesić: Why is Tadić angry?

Croatian President Stjepan Mesić said that he does not see a reason for his Serbian counterpart Boris Tadić to be angry over his visit to Kosovo.

“I would have supported him coming with me here and meeting with Kosovo President Fatmir Sejdiu and the citizens that welcomed us whole-heartedly,” Mesić said after visiting the Croatian minority in the Kosovo village of Janjevo.

Hina stated that Tadić, reacting to Mesić’s Kosovo visit, said that it was one of the decisions with which Mesić was hurting relations with Serbia and leaving an unnecessary burden on the shoulders of his successor.

Tadić also condemned Mesić’s decision to reducing the sentence of war criminal Siniša Rimac, convicted of killing 23 ethnic Serb civilians in Croatia in 1991.

Tadić called it an “anti-European and anti-civilizational gesture which cannot be justified by any means.”

Mesić said that Tadić “knows very well that sentence reductions are given due to circumstances, not because of what someone did and why they were convicted.”

“Since Tadić knows very well what it is about, his criticism does not upset me, because it is for his own domestic uses,” Mesić said, according to Hina.

Mesić initially planned to visit Kosovo on the Orthodox Christian Christmas, January 7, but changed the date to January 8 after strong criticism from Belgrade.