PM says European Commission's tourism package extremely important

Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said on Wednesday that the documents on tourism and transport adopted by the European Commission were extremely important, and that the discussion about them had been initiated by Croatia and him personally.

Ahead of an inner cabinet meeting Plenkovic said it was on Croatia's and his own initiative that the discussion started at the European Council about the fact that a large number of EU member states consider tourism as an important industry.

He was thus pleased, he added, that the European Commission presented proposals for member states on what to do concerning the coronavirus pandemic weakening at the global and national levels.

Croatia soon to organise new meeting of EU tourism ministers

"... Tourism Minister Gari Cappelli will organise in the coming days, as he has done before, a new meeting of EU tourism ministers, following the release of the European Commission's documents, so that they could agree on operational implementation," Plenkovic said.

He assessed that it was important for Croatia to reactivate, by relaxing restrictions, its economy as much as possible, including tourism, and that to that end the measures introduced to facilitate crossing the borders for business reasons would also increasingly serve to revitalise tourism.

"Croatia's talks with neighbouring countries that are equally successful in fighting COVID-19 serve a similar purpose," Plenkovic said.

Asked which countries Croatia had talked to about cooperation in tourism and when the first tourists might arrive, he said that they were in talks with "many" countries.

"The tourism minister is talking to his colleagues, and I talked to a large number of prime ministers - in Slovenia, Hungary, Austria, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Germany and in a score of other interested countries," Plenkovic said.

Croatia is more than an attractive destination for all those who know us, and it is in our interest that the tourists who arrive act the same as Croatian citizens in the coronacrisis, that is, be extremely responsible, said the PM.

The European Commission recommended on Wednesday a gradual and coordinated lifting of travel restrictions between member states or regions within them that have similar epidemiological situations in order to salvage as much of the tourist season as possible.

The EC released guidelines and recommendations, which are not binding on member states, but can help to lift the travel restrictions in a coordinated way and to gradually activate the tourism sector after several months of complete standstill caused by the coronavirus pandemic.(Hina/FaH)

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