Russian Investors Plan To Develop 1.0 Bln Euro Tourism Project in Croatia

Russian investors led by the state-run Russian Technologies State Corporation have offered to the Croatian government a project to develop a luxury tourism complex worth one billion euro ($1.4 billion) in Kupari, on the southern Croatian Adriatic coast.

"The Russians are lobbying for this investment on the highest level and the head of state-run corportation Russian Technologies, Sergey Cemezov, sent a letter to this end to Prime Minister Ivo Sanader this summer," daily Vecernji List reported. No officials at Russian Technologies or at its representative in Croatia, trading company ACM, were immediately available to comment.

The Russian proposal is for the construction of six five-star hotels and 122 luxury villas, restaurants, shopping centres, an entertainment park and a yacht club on a state-owned land plot of 80 hectares near the top Adriatic resort of Dubrovnik. The site currently accommodates disused buildings.

The complex should be completed in 2015 and should create 5,000 jobs. Every project of this kind must be approved through a tender procedure, Vecernji quoted unnamed government sources as saying.

Russian Technologies State Corporation is a legal body established by the Russian Federation Government to assist Russian industrial design and manufacturing organisations in developing, producing and exporting high technology industrial products on the domestic and foreign markets, and attracting investments to enterprises in various sectors of industry.