Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic stated on Thursday that he no longer has confidence in the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Tihomir Kundic, after Kundic failed to respond to his invitation for a meeting at Banski Dvori.
According to the prime minister, the meeting was intended to discuss the situation regarding the participation of Croatian soldiers in commemorations for French Bastille Day. "If Kundic refused to come because Milanovic sent him on orders to Slunj for a military exercise, that is a poor political and, in my view, professional assessment," Plenkovic said in HTV's Dnevnik, assessing that it was therefore normal for confidence in Kundic to be lost.
He added that this does not mean withholding support for the Croatian Army. "These are two different things," he said, emphasising that the government is increasing the defence budget and investing in the modernisation of the Armed Forces. He also asserted that the conflict is not personal: "Otherwise, we have excellent relations. This is nothing personal; he simply made a very wrong and poor decision and assessment at that moment."
The prime minister recalled that President of the Republic Zoran Milanovic, in his words, has for the second time restricted Kundic's movements — earlier, he claims, he did not allow him to come to the Croatian Parliament when the NATO training mission for Ukrainian soldiers, NSATU, was being discussed. He described the entire situation as "a shame for Milanovic" and Kundic's actions as "completely immature".
Plenkovic described Milanovic's policy as "anti-Ukrainian, pro-Russian, often anti-European, and often even anti-NATO policy" which, he believes, is leading Croatia to isolation. He dismissed claims that anyone had proposed sending Croatian soldiers to Ukraine, calling it a "false topic" that has persisted in the political sphere for three years.
In the same interview, he accused the opposition of obstructing the selection of the remaining three judges for the Constitutional Court and rejected the possibility of early elections. On the eve of the tenth anniversary of his leadership of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), he stated that he feels "better than ever" and that the party has the strength for a fourth term.
