The leader of the opposition populist Most party, Bozo Petrov, said on Monday that emigration was the biggest challenge faced by Croatia since its accession to the European Union, and criticised the incumbent government for failing to seriously tackle the issue.

Petrov accused the government of taking only cosmetic measures in a bid to halt the depopulation trend.

“There are no concrete, serious moves to address the challenge of emigration,” Petrov told a news conference in Zagreb on Monday.

He accused the government of failing to adopt a demographic strategy to alleviate the effects of the population decline.

Petra Mandic, a Rijeka councillor from this party, presented Most’s proposal that the minimum amount of monthly allowance during parental leave should be HRK 3,991 instead of the current minimum of HRK 2,328.

Most is in favour of introducing a monthly allowance of HRK 135 for parents with one child and of HRK 2,000 and more for parents with three children, depending on their income.

(€1= HRK 7.4)