Deputy leader of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) Ranko Ostojic on Thursday claimed that the line-up of a "militia" in the main square in Zagreb during Saturday's protest of antivaxxers and opponents of COVID certificates highlighted the authorities's weakness because they failed to react.

“Ignoring the fact that someone lines up 2,000 people – when militias begin to emerge that would like to put themselves at the disposal of the police and army, and 2,000 people is a serious number – tells us that there should be a reaction, yet there wasn’t any,” Ostojic, a former interior minister in the government of PM Zoran Milanovic, told a press conference.

Referring to the line-up of the alleged 1st volunteer battalion, Ostojic stressed that allowing the line-up speaks about the weakness of the state, “which has gone into hiding and is afraid of confronting the situation.”

He noted that, while he had been the Interior Minister, he had banned a similar gathering but now the police and state prosecutor’s office remained silent.

Speaking about the security situation in the country, which was the reason for his press conference, Ostojic touched on the migrant crisis in Europe, saying that in 2015 the European Union did not manage to resolve two key issues – to create a common policy towards migrants and to  amend the Dublin Agreement.

EU has to find a common solution for the migrant crisis

” As long as the EU does not find a common solution, it is not important through which door to the EU they (undocumented migrants) are entering, the problem will continue to be the same,” claimed Ostojic and added that it is particularly important for Croatia which plans to access the Schengen Area soon.

Referring to the case of the death of a six-year-old Afghan girl, Madina Hussiny, he said that it deserves special attention because it is more than likely that in Croatia “we have who knows how many similar cases that have not been investigated.”

Ostojic also referred to the role of the State Prosecutor’s Office to thoroughly investigate this and other cases of violation of human rights on Croatia’s borders.