Treaty of Osimo
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The Treaty of Osimo was signed on November 10, 1975 by the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Italy in Osimo definitively dividing the Free Territory of Trieste. The treaty was written in French and came into power on October 11, 1977.
The treaty was based on the "Memorandum of Understanding" that was signed in London in 1954, which gave a provisional civil administration of Zone A to Italy, and Zone B to Yugoslavia. The Treaty of Osimo merely made this situation definite. Zone A, including the city of Trieste, became the Italian Province of Trieste, but Yugoslavia would be granted free access to the port of Trieste.
The treaty was signed by Eugenio Carbone for Italy and the Yugoslavian minister for foreign affairs Miloš Minić.
Criticism in Italy
The Italian government was criticized harshly for signing the treaty. Italian nationalists rejected the idea of giving up Istria, which had belonged to Italy for 25 years between World War I and World War II. Further, the treaty did not guarantee the protection of the Italian minority in the Yugoslavian zone - while it also didn't do this for the Slovenian minority in the Italian zone. The question of protection of minorities was postponed to later discussions.This delicate situation led to the treaty not being signed as usual by the minister for foreign affairs. Instead, Eugenio Carbone, the general director of the ministry for industry signed for Italy, in place of prime minister Aldo Moro and minister for foreign affairs Mariano Rumor.
Slovenia's and Croatia's independence
Slovenia declared its independence in 1991 and in 1992 it was recognized internationally. Though the treaty's applicability was now in question, Slovenia then released a declaration, saying it would recognize the treaty. A solution of this question had been made a pre-condition for a Slovenian entry into the European Union.No such declaration was made by the Croatian government. However, Italy did not find this as important, since the Croatian part of the Free Territory of Trieste does not border Italy and there is no significant Croatian minority in the Italian part of the territory in question. The treaty was never questioned by Croatia.
References
This article is based on a translation of an article from the [German Wikipedia].
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