EU to delay Croatia entry talks over missing war crimes suspect

The EU will delay the start of membership talks with Croatia because Zagreb has failed to surrender a former general to the UN war crimes tribunal, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said today.

Entry negotiations had been scheduled to start tomorrow.

But Mr Straw said in Brussels: “Our judgment is that it cannot take place from tomorrow, because a key precondition for the beginning of the negotiations was full cooperation with the international criminal tribunal in the Hague, and I regret that the evidence is that Croatia has not co-operated as fully as we would wish.”