The ruling Croatian Democratic Union’s (HDZ) new international secretary and Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic said on Tuesday that party leader and Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic enjoyed the party's full support and that claims that the government's reform capacity had weakened did not hold water.

Bozinovic was in Luxembourg to attend a meeting of European Union interior ministers. On Monday, he replaced Miro Kovac as the HDZ’s international secretary.

“The HDZ is a big party, the political engine in Croatia and… Plenkovic will certainly continue to lead Croatia in the direction we aspire to, which is to deal with the problems amassed during Croatia’s transition while maintaining all the macroeconomic indicators. This is already a big success of his running both the party and the government and we will keep it up,” Bozinovic told Croatian reporters covering his visit to Luxembourg, asked to comment on recent changes in the government and the HDZ.

“Andrej Plenkovic’s position has never been in question. All those who were two years ago deciding on the best candidate to take the HDZ to win the election and then assume responsibility for running the state decided by consensus that that person was Andrej Plenkovic, and nothing has changed about that.”

Asked to comment on some claims in public that recent events had diminished the government’s reform capacity, Bozinovic said this was not so.

“You’ll see that very soon the government will propose new measures for the pension reform, the tax reform etc. A lot has already been done and it’s perhaps a little unfair that the whole Agrokor story has overshadowed a lot of the good that has happened,” he said, adding that Croatia recorded a surplus for the first time under the incumbent government.

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