Marko Milanovic-Litre, a Croatian Sovereignists MP and member of a committee organising a referendum campaign to protect the kuna, said in Zagreb on Saturday that 157,000 signatures had been collected for their petition to protect the national currency and that the organisers were satisfied.

The referendum initiative against plans to introduce the euro was launched by the Croatian Sovereignists, the Croatian Party of Rights, the Independents for Croatia and the Renewal Generation.

The organisers are expected to collect 368,867 valid signatures for a referendum by 7 November.

The signatures are being collected at 250 venues across the country, and citizens are asked to say if they want the country’s constitution to state that the Croatian unit of currency is the kuna, which is divided into one hundred lipas, and that a decision on changing the unit of currency should be made by voters in a referendum.