PM Inaugurates Zagreb-Lipovac Highway

Prime Minister Ivo Sanader on Friday inaugurated a 30 km section of the A3 highway from Županja to Lipovac, marking the completion of the 307 km Bregana-Zagreb-Lipovac highway after 29 years.

The highway is part of the pan-European corridor X and provides the shortest and best link between Western and Southeast Europe and further to the Middle East. This is the first completed highway in Croatia.

The construction of the Županja-Lipovac highway, which was completed three months ahead of deadline, cost EUR 91 million and was financed with loans from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank.

The inauguration was held at toll booths near Lipovac, not far from the Bajakovo border crossing with Serbia.

Sanader said Croatia would have finished the construction of highways and other infrastructure a long time ago had there been no war and decades of communist dictatorship.

"We still have to set aside six to seven billion kuna from the budget to cover indirect and direct war damage," he said, adding that despite earmarking huge funds for the renovation and building of the infrastructure, the government had managed to bring order into public finance.

Sanader announced the fiscal deficit this year would be three per cent although the government had planned 3.3 per cent. He said that three years ago, the fiscal deficit was 6.3 per cent.

"That's an outstanding step for Croatia which, I hope, domestic and foreign investors will appreciate," Sanader said, adding that by reducing the fiscal deficit to three per cent the government had met the Maastricht convergence criteria.

Given the vicinity of the Serbian border, Sanader took the opportunity to say that Croatia wanted to develop good neighborly relations with Serbia as well as with Montenegro.

Transport and Development Minister Božidar Kalmeta said Croatia had 1,070 km of highways and needs about 1,500 km. He added that construction was under way on many sections.

The CEO of the Croatian Highways company, Mario Crnjak, said that alongside the A1 highway from Zagreb to Split, A3 was the most important highway in the country.

Eleven million vehicles drove down A3 in 2005, or 12,500 daily, bringing the state 650 million kuna in revenue, or 1.8 million daily.

News from media