Pelješac

Marjan Pipenbaher, the chief designer of the Pelješac Bridge in Croatia, has been declared the Person of the Year by the newspaper Delo. One of the most renowned European bridge builders and designers, Pipenbaher has designed more than 200 brides and viaducts in Slovenia and abroad.

The Peljesac Bridge, linking Croatia's Peljesac peninsula with the rest of the country, was fully joined together on Wednesday night, with the installation of the last, 165th segment of its steel span.

Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia have traded threats over the construction of the Peljesac Bridge that is designed to connect the Croatian mainland with its southernmost region, cutting across the narrow exit from Bosnia's only coastal town of Neum to the open sea.

Croatian MEP Tonino Picula on Tuesday asked the European Commission to give Croatia funds and equipment to help it put out fires raging along the Croatian coast.

Besides seeking help from the EU's Solidarity fund, he urged Brussels to send fire-fighting equipment.

Croatia on Wednesday announced that plans to build a long-awaited bridge over the Adriatic sea, connecting the Peljesac peninsula to the mainland, will get underway next year.

An idea dating back to the late 1990s, the 2.4-km-long bridge should connect up two parts of Croatia divided by a 14-km stretch of territory belonging to Bosnia.

Croatian governments have long been announcing a new start to construction of the Peljesac Bridge, a key communications structure that would circumvent Bosnia's short coastline and connect the southern Dubrovnik region with the rest of Croatia.