The Croatian Heritage Foundation marked its 70th anniversary at the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb on Friday, with President Zoran Milanovic calling for unity on the status of Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

In his address, the president called for unity on key matters, saying that today one of them, to a certain extent, was the status of Croats in BiH.

“Their homeland is BiH as it was designed 26 years ago by an international agreement which was signed by Croatia and which it will honour in good faith.”

Milanovic said there was a big chance to position Croatia among the most advanced states in Europe, “there where it never was but where it belongs.”

He said the Croatian nation had been a dream whose realisation depended on “a few good, right people” who gathered around that idea at a certain moment in history.

The Croatian Heritage Foundation is an institution representing a “firm and safe bridge to the homeland” for about 3.5 million Croats and their descendants around the world, it was said at the event.

The deputy speaker of the BiH Parliament’s House of Peoples, Dragan Covic, thanked Milanovic for “speaking very loudly these days about the role of the Croat people in BiH.”

“We are proud to have Croatia as our homeland, but we won’t renounce BiH as our homeland either. There’s 15% of us in BiH, but as the least numerous, we are the most industrious. We are the leaders of all positive integration processes in BiH,” Covic said.

He thanked Croatia’s officials for encouraging Croats in BiH to preserve their equality as a constituent people and ensure legitimate representation at all government levels.