Serbia welcomes UN stance on use of Cyrillic in Croatia

BELGRADE - Serbia welcomes the UN Human Rights Committee's report calling on Croatia to ensure that national minorities can use their own language and script, especially Cyrillic in Vukovar, Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic said Friday.

"We can only welcome such an attitude, and we do not want the issue brought to the fore in order to be against someone in Croatia, but rather because we believe it to be normal and civilized (to grant somebody freedom to use their language and script), just like in Serbia no one has any objection to the Croatian language being used," Dacic told a news conference.

Accordingly, we absolutely believe that Serbia and Croatia should provide the highest possible level of rights to all, Dacic said.

The report of the UN Human Rights Committee on the human rights situation in Croatia, published today, expresses concern over the fact that national minorities encounter problems when trying to use their mother tongue, especially when it comes to the Cyrillic script.

Photo Tanjug, N. Milosevic (archive)