The justice ministers of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina said on Tuesday the two countries should change bilateral agreements that prevent prosecution and execution of sentences for persons who have committed a crime in one country and have fled to the other to avoid serving their sentence.

The two ministers, Ivan Malenica of Croatia and Josip Grubesa of Bosnia and Herzegovina, met in Sarajevo, and after the meeting, which was unannounced and was held behind closed doors, the BiH Justice Ministry issued a statement saying the two officials discussed cooperation, with emphasis on bilateral agreements on the mutual recognition and enforcement of judgments in criminal cases in the other country and the agreement on extradition.

The two ministers expressed a will and interest for both countries to advance their cooperation and deal with all outstanding issues in the field of judiciary, including the possibility of amending the bilateral agreement regulating the enforcement of judgments with the aim of finding a joint solution regarding their differing views, the BiH ministry said.

The meeting was evidently prompted by the fact that the brothers Zdravko and Zoran Mamic, who have been given final verdicts in Croatia for siphoning money from the Dinamo football club, have fled to Bosnia and Herzegovina, one before and the other after the final verdicts were announced.

They now both live in Međugorje and refer to their BiH citizenship which prevents their extradition to Croatia. Their case, however, is only one in a number of similar cases because other convicts, like Miroslav Kutle and Branimir Glavas, had previously fled to Bosnia and Herzegovina, abusing their dual citizenship.

The two ministers also agreed to start dealing with the implementation of the agreement on succession to the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia as well as to make it possible to check the property of BiH nationals in Croatia and its background and vice versa.