Relations with Bosnia and Herzegovina, as one of Croatia's most important strategic partners, need to be intensified, Croatian Foreign Minister Marija Pejčinović-Burić said at the beginning of her two-day official visit to Sarajevo on Wednesday.

Pejčinović-Burić met with her Bosnian counterpart Igor Crnadak and later attended the opening of the office of the Croatian Chamber of Economy (HGK) at the Croatian Embassy.

This is part of the strategy to combine Croatian capacities abroad and strengthen its political and economic ties with important countries, Pejčinović-Burić told a news conference.

“The government wants to respond to the challenges of the time in the best way possible,” she said, adding that a similar model of combining classic and economic diplomacy was used by Austria and Germany.

Such offices should ensure better management of the existing resources and provide a more complete service required by businesses.

Pejčinović-Burić said that stronger economic ties between Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina would lead to an improvement of overall relations between the two countries. She said that Croatia had a duty to look after the Croats living in Bosnia and Herzegovina and contribute to the country’s stability.

She added that the Chamber of Economy would open its office at the Croatian Consulate General in Mostar next week.

Head of the Chamber, Luka Burilović, said that Sarajevo was chosen for the new office after Brussels, Moscow, and Shanghai because “Bosnia is a natural foreign trade partner to us and always among top five most important countries.”

Croatia-Bosnia trade in 2017 reached nearly €2.2 billion, with Croatia’s exports to Bosnia amounting to more than €1.5 billion.

Pejčinović-Burić is scheduled to hold separate talks on Thursday with the High Representative Valentin Inzko, Croat member of the Bosnian collective tripartite presidency Dragan Čović, and the Sarajevo Archbishop, Cardinal Vinko Puljić.