European countries should assume greater responsibility for their own security through NATO and the EU given that the United States "is increasingly preoccupied with the Indo-Pacific and China," Croatian Foreign Minster Gordan Grlic-Radman said on Friday.

“Because of all that, as well as the fact that we no longer live in stable post-Cold War times, the EU can no longer rely only on soft security instruments, but must develop capabilities for independent crisis management, including military ones,” he said in a Conference on the Future of Europe debate in the Istrian city of Pula.

Still, he added, Croatia “clearly sees NATO as the main guarantor of Euro-Atlantic security and its NATO membership as the main protection from possible external aggression.”

“We advocate further deepening the partnership with NATO, which remains the cornerstone of our collective defence, and strengthening cooperation with the most important partner, the United States, in a score of topics,” said Grlic-Radman.

Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias also took part in the debate, saying that strengthening Europe’s defence policy is complementary with NATO.

“Can we rely on NATO? For Greece, and we have a real security problem, there is no dilemma. The European defence initiative is of use for NATO and Euro-Atlantic cooperation,” he said, adding that those are not two “antagonistic” concepts.

The most prominent advocate of strengthening European defence cooperation and creating a European army is French President Emmanuel Macron.

“We must be realistic. If we want the EU as a global actor, we must start at home and in our neighbourhood. We need more unity and more solidarity. We must take others’ security problems very seriously,” Dendias said.

Position towards Bosnia

Grlic-Radman reiterated Croatia’s stand on the need to change Bosnia and Herzegovina’s electoral law before this year’s vote in order to prevent the more numerous Bosniaks from electing Croat representatives in the House of Peoples and the Croat member of the Presidency.

“Bosnia and Herzegovina is at a crossroads. An agreement on changes to the electoral law and restricted constitutional changes would improve the political atmosphere in the country and replace the existing mistrust between the key political parties, with a view to achieving a more stable and more prosperous Bosnia,” he said.

“The absence of an agreement would push Bosnia deeper into political crisis with fatal consequences,” he said, reiterating that Croatia pushes for Bosnia as one state of three constituent peoples and two entities.