Croatia

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Croatia’s ruling conservatives win parliamentary vote, but cannot rule alone

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — Croatia ‘s governing conservatives convincingly won a highly contested parliamentary election Wednesday, but will still need support from far-right groups to stay in power, according to the official vote count.

https://apnews.com/article/croatia-election-european-union-plenkovic-milanovic-b3a93b2598f60ebfdf663815dda2c0ad?

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Croatia’s President Milanović wins another term after defeating ruling party candidate in runoff

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — Croatia’s opposition-backed President Zoran Milanović, a critic of the European Union and NATO, overwhelmingly won reelection for another five-year term on Sunday, defeating a candidate from the ruling conservative party in a runoff vote, official results showed.

https://apnews.com/article/croatia-election-milanovic-plenkovic-58faa5040751b131edc4b34c03f18e18?

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Croatia warns against travel to Serbia after civil society activists deported Croatia warned its citizens Thursday to postpone unnecessary travel to neighboring Serbia after the detention and deportation of five Croatian activists who had taken part in a meeting of civil society organizations in the Serbian capital, Belgrade. The Croatian activists were also banned from entering Serbia for a year, according to HRT state television. Read more.

Why this matters: The Croatian activists said police offered no reason except a document stating the activists represented a threat to Serbia’s security. Citizens from Romania, Slovenia, Bosnia and North Macedonia who were taking part in a workshop for nongovernmental organizations also were deported this week, human rights organizations in Serbia said.   Serbia’s populist government has repeatedly and without offering evidence accused Croatian security services of being behind weekslong protests by university students who are demanding accountability for the collapse of a concrete canopy on Nov. 1. The canopy crash at a railway station in Novi Sad killed 15 people, triggering major anti-corruption protests, with striking students calling for a general strike on Friday.

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Croatian right-wing singer Marko Perkovic and fans perform pro-Nazi salute at massive concert

A hugely popular right-wing Croatian singer and hundreds of thousands of his fans performed a pro-Nazi World War II salute at a massive concert in Zagreb, drawing criticism. One of Marko Perkovic’s most popular songs, starts with the dreaded “For the homeland — Ready!” salute, used by Croatia’s Nazi-era puppet Ustasha regime that ran concentration camps at the time. Read more.