Croatia

ZAGREB- Milorad Pupovac, leader of the Serb National Council in Croatia, said on Saturday that Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic has broken the ice in relations between Croatia and Serbia with his decision to attend the inauguration of new Croatian President Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic thereby making an important step for the continuation of the political dialogue.

ZAGREB- Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic, Croatia's newly appointed president, and Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic will have a separate bilateral meeting in Zagreb on Sunday, said Mladen Pavic, spokesman for the Croatian president, adding that this will be an opportunity for the two states to finally begin solving the accumulated problems.

The Croatian Foreign Ministry on Thursday told volunteers to come back home and stop fighting for the Ukrainian army and special police units in Ukraine.

The ministry's message comes after the Russian foreign ministry on the same day issued a complaint that Croats were violating a peace deal.

BELGRADE - A team of students enrolled on courses at the Tourism and Hotel Management Department of the University of Belgrade Faculty of Economics won the second Adria Student Innovation Contest (ASIC), an annual international competition held in Zagreb, the Faculty of Economics has said in a release.

Croatia urged to prevent citizens joining Ukraine war

ZAGREB, MOSCOW -- The Russian Foreign Ministry has asked Zagreb to prevent "the perverse practice" of Croats joining Ukraine's army, according to the Croatian website Index.

After a period of negotiating between the centre-left government and other parties on the left, Croatian parliament will pass on Friday a new law on electing members of parliament, introducing some crucial changes.

Vucic confirms he'll attend inauguration in Zagreb

BELGRADE -- Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic has confirmed that he will attend the inauguration of new Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarevic.

According to him the decision was "difficult to make" and is good neither for him personally nor for his party, the SNS.

The Bulgarian national football team dropped four positions in the latest FIFA world ranking, which was released on Thursday.

At present Bulgaria occupies the 70th position with 506 points, being one place behind Norway, which is one of its direct opponents in the qualifications for EURO 2016.

KAZAN - Serbia's water polo team will compete in Group D with Montenegro, Australia and Japan at the World Championship this year, the draw decided on Thursday.

The remaining groups will gather:

Group A: Croatia, Brazil, Canada and China,

Group B: Greece, the U.S., Italy and Russia,

Group C: South Africa, Hungary, Argentina and Kazakhstan.

BELGRADE - Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic met on Thursday with Canadian Ambassador to Serbia Phillip Pinnington, who conveyed the support of the Canadian government to the policy of economic, political and regional stability pursued by the government of Serbia.