ZAGREB (Reuters) – Croatia’s prime minister-designate Jadranka Kosor was elected to lead the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) on Saturday, a day after she was mandated to form a new center-right coalition government. Kosor, Croatia’s former deputy prime minister, replaces Prime Minister Ivo Sanader who unexpectedly stepped down this week in the middle of his second term. Sanader, who gave no reasons for his departure, was elected honorary party president. “I will work for the benefit of the Croatian people, the country and all its citizens. Our immediate task is to tackle the budget rebalance this month,” Kosor told a party convention where she won the unanimous backing of delegates.

A Bosnian court said on Saturday it had temporarily suspended a recently adopted law on protection of domestic production seen as violating a regional trade pact and the Balkan country’s commitments toward the EU. The Constitutional Court of Bosnia-Herzegovina decided to suspend the law at the request of the chairman of the upper house of the country’s parliament, Ilija Filipovic, it said in a statement. The law will be suspended until the court reaches a final decision on Filipovic’s motion at one of its coming sessions. The controversial law imposing higher customs duties on nearly 1,000 items was passed by parliament earlier this month, despite strong opposition from the European Union and Bosnia’s neighbors. (AFP)

The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) on Saturday reported its first swine flu cases but stressed that the two patients had already recovered. “The results of the analyses conducted in a reference laboratory in London showed that two people tested positive for the H1N1 influenza,” Health Minister Bujar Osmani said. “They have been completely cured,” he said, adding they had recently returned from holidays in countries where the disease had been spreading. (AFP)