Pelosi Remarks at Press Conference with His Excellency Andrej Plenković, Prime Minister of Croatia

Statement

Speaker Nancy Pelosi joined His Excellency Andrej Plenković, Prime Minister of Croatia, for a press conference after a bilateral meeting. Below are the Speaker's remarks, followed by Q&A:

Speaker Pelosi. Thank you very much, Mr. Prime Minister, for your words of welcome, for the opportunity to hear your views as to what is happening in Ukraine and to give us the opportunity to thank you for your tremendous leadership when it comes to Ukraine and, of course, Croatia.

When we received the invitation, when I was in Berlin for the G7, and the Speaker of the Ukraine Parliament -- I think they call him Mr. President there too; we call it Speaker, but -- extended the invitation to come to Croatia for this meeting. It was clear that he felt very comfortable inviting speakers of the world to come here, because the friendships that you have extended, the appreciation you have for the courage of Ukrainian people in their fight for democracy, which is a fight not just for Ukraine, but for democracy throughout the world. And for the military assistance you have provided, the refugee assistance that you have provided, the moral assistance that Croatia has provided under your leadership, Mr. Prime Minister.

It is, as the Prime Minister said, we talked about our mutual concern about Ukraine, what we can do working together as we go forward. And the importance of this meeting on Crimea, initiative, platform, first summit in this regard that is being held in Zagreb. It's an honor to be here. And again, perfect, a perfect place to have this.

Secondly, we did talk about U.S.-Croatia relationships. Our students study side-by-side, our soldiers trained shoulder-to-shoulder, our leaders work hand-in-hand. This is a very important relationship for us.

The Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, others, the Speaker earlier, but the Prime Minister in our meeting just now was talking about some things that -- we are pleased to have the visa waiver situation resolved. But we're also wanting to do the double taxation agreement very soon. And other areas where we try to work together more closely to enhance our roles in making peace, democracy and freedom spread in the region and in the world. So we thank Croatia for its leadership.

It's a country small enough to be resilient, but big enough to be significant in terms of security and democracy and peace and values. And values are what comes through in any conversation with the Prime Minister because of the experience you have had in your own country in the past, in terms of violence and the rest, and specifically mining and things like that, and trauma after violence, that you can be helpful to Ukraine and others subjected to Russian aggression. So I thank you for that.

So it's about our relationship with each other writ large. It's our working together for Ukraine. And I'm very pleased in both of those regards, to be -- as a co-leader of our delegation on this trip, Congressman Gerry Connolly of Virginia. He was elected by the NATO Parliamentary Assembly to be their President. And in that capacity, he was invited by the Ukraine to participate in this meeting, and he had some valuable perspectives from NATO to add to the conversation. Then, here, but also as we go forward, tomorrow.

So for us, it's an honor that an American is the head of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, in light of some years before when there's some doubt about how people viewed our commitment to NATO. Thank you, Mr. Connelly, for your leadership.

The security and stability, when we travel or leave our country, when any of our delegations go forward, and just recently, we had the Chair of the Armed Services Committee -- Chairman Adam Smith -- here, again, focusing on the importance of the U.S.-Croatia relationship and security. Security is our number one issue. Economics, that's one of our primary issues as well, and governance. And in all three areas, we have a very positive relationship, and we learn a lot from each other. We certainly learned from Croatia.

Just one final but last point being about energy. Energy happens to be a leverage point in this war. The Russians have supplied, been the supplier of energy, and countries now have to diversify so that we're not being blackmailed by Russia as we go forward. A leader in showing the way in that regard has been Croatia. So thank you for your leadership in that regard.

And Mr. Prime Minister, thank you for the honor of visiting with you here. Thank you for the hospitality extended to all of us, for peace in Ukraine. And thank you for your personal leadership in all of this.

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