Croatia’s conservative president is to face a liberal former prime minister in a runoff election early next month after no candidate won an outright majority in a first round of voting on Sunday, near-complete results showed.
The vote was held just days before Croatia takes over the EU’s presidency for the first time. The governing conservatives are hoping to keep their grip on power ahead of assuming the EU chairmanship.
Left-wing former prime minister Zoran Milanovic led the field with nearly 30 percent of the votes in preliminary returns. Croatian President Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic had almost 27 percent, state election authorities said after counting almost all ballots.
Photo: Reuters
Right-wing singer Miroslav Skoro was in third place with about 24 percent.
About 3.8 million voters in the EU’s newest member country chose from among 11 candidates in Sunday’s election, but only the top three finishers had been considered serious contenders.
Milanovic and Grabar Kitarovic are to face each other in a second round of voting on Jan. 5.
Although the incumbent finished second in the first round, analysts said Grabar Kitarovic could be considered a favorite in the runoff, because other right-leaning challengers would no longer be in contention.
Addressing supporters, Grabar Kitarovic called for all those on the right to unite behind her candidacy in the second round.
She described the first round as a “10 on 1 battle.”
“Unlike Mr Milanovic, I had a tough fellow-candidate at my political specter,” Grabar Kitarovic said. “Now, we must all gather together and go for a victory.”
Milanovic, too, said he can win and called for a “civilized civic match” and not a battle, referring to traditionally deep divisions in Crotia between the political left and right.
“We are going to the second round, not a war,” he said. “Let the better one of us win and I believe I am better.”
Croatia’s presidency is largely ceremonial. The office holder formally commands the army and represents the nation abroad.
However, retaining the post is important for the ruling Croatian Democratic Union party, known as HDZ, as Croatia prepares for its six-month term in the EU presidency.
The job will include overseeing Britain’s departure from the bloc, expected to take place on Jan. 31, and the start of post-Brexit trade talks.
Grabar Kitarovic started off her campaign looking strong, but her position weakened after a series of gaffes. The 51-year-old incumbent is known for flirting with the extreme right, while seeking also to portray herself as a people’s president.
Milanovic promised during the campaign to turn Croatia into a “normal,” tolerant country.
Although Croatia has recovered since the devastating 1991-1995 war that followed the breakup of former Yugoslavia, it still is one of the poorest nations in the EU and corruption is believed to be widespread.
The nation of 4.2 million people is best known for its stunning Adriatic Sea coast, which includes more than 1,000 islands and picturesque coastal towns, such as the medieval walled city of Dubrovnik.
Critics blasted the government for setting the election date three days before Christmas, a time when many people travel abroad.
The HDZ party, they said, counted on the support from Croats who live abroad and normally flock home for the holidays.
Analysts said the strong showing by the right-wing Skoro party signaled that the HDZ had lost some support among party followers ahead of a parliamentary election set for next year.
PARLIAMENT CHAOS: Police forcibly removed Brazilian Deputy Glauber Braga after he called the legislation part of a ‘coup offensive’ and occupied the speaker’s chair Brazil’s lower house of Congress early yesterday approved a bill that could slash former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s prison sentence for plotting a coup, after efforts by a lawmaker to disrupt the proceedings sparked chaos in parliament. Bolsonaro has been serving a 27-year term since last month after his conviction for a scheme to stop Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from taking office after the 2022 election. Lawmakers had been discussing a bill that would significantly reduce sentences for several crimes, including attempting a coup d’etat — opening up the prospect that Bolsonaro, 70, could have his sentence cut to
China yesterday held a low-key memorial ceremony for the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) not attending, despite a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Taiwan. Beijing has raged at Tokyo since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last month said that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Japan. China and Japan have long sparred over their painful history. China consistently reminds its people of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, in which it says Japanese troops killed 300,000 people in what was then its capital. A post-World War II Allied tribunal put the death toll
‘UNWAVERING ALLIANCE’: The US Department of State said that China’s actions during military drills with Russia were not conducive to regional peace and stability The US on Tuesday criticized China over alleged radar deployments against Japanese military aircraft during a training exercise last week, while Tokyo and Seoul yesterday scrambled jets after Chinese and Russian military aircraft conducted joint patrols near the two countries. The incidents came after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi triggered a dispute with Beijing last month with her remarks on how Tokyo might react to a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan. “China’s actions are not conducive to regional peace and stability,” a US Department of State spokesperson said late on Tuesday, referring to the radar incident. “The US-Japan alliance is stronger and more
FALLEN: The nine soldiers who were killed while carrying out combat and engineering tasks in Russia were given the title of Hero of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea North Korean leader Kim Jong-un attended a welcoming ceremony for an army engineering unit that had returned home after carrying out duties in Russia, North Korean state media KCNA reported on Saturday. In a speech carried by KCNA, Kim praised officers and soldiers of the 528th Regiment of Engineers of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) for “heroic” conduct and “mass heroism” in fulfilling orders issued by the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea during a 120-day overseas deployment. Video footage released by North Korea showed uniformed soldiers disembarking from an aircraft, Kim hugging a soldier seated in a wheelchair, and soldiers and officials