7 May 2010
Ottawa, Ontario
Prime Minister Stephen Harper today issued the following statement at the conclusion of his meeting with Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor of Croatia:
"I am very delighted to be here. This is the first visit of a Canadian Prime Minister to Croatia. It is overdue, given the strong and historic relations that exist between Canada and Croatia. We have a robust engagement, with growing business and commercial ties and, most importantly, we have more than 200,000 Canadians of Croatian origin that represent the strongest of all the links between our countries.
As Canadians, we’re all delighted, but of course not at all surprised, at the great progress that Croatia has made since it joined the democratic community of nations. It is particularly important that Croatia joined NATO in 2009, something that Canada strongly supported.
Croatia has proven to be a true ally of Canada in Afghanistan, as well as supporting our campaign for a seat at the United Nations Security Council. Today, we have just signed a bilateral youth mobility arrangement which will further strengthen the strong and valuable relationship that exists between our two countries and between our two peoples.
I won’t enumerate all of the various items we discussed; the Prime Minister has done an excellent job of summarizing our very productive discussions across a wide range of issues. Prime Minister, I want to thank you again for your hospitality."
