Croatia's ports will not be used for unloading chemical agents from Syria before their destruction on a U.S. ship, as Italy has accepted to take part in the process, an official said Sunday.

"Although Croatia was ready... it will not be done here, as we have been approached relatively late and Italy has accepted after long discussions to have it done, "Croatia's Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic said according to Hina state news agency.

A petition that would curb rights for ethnic Serbs in Croatia has enough support -- 650,000 signatures -- to go to a referendum, a Croatian veterans' group said Friday.

But while the group says the petition has the requisite backing of 10 percent of the electorate to automatically become a plebiscite, the center-left government is intent on blocking it.

Gay rights supporters in conservative and mainly Catholic Croatia staged protests on Saturday on the eve of a controversial referendum that could outlaw same-sex marriage in the EU's newest member state.

More than 1,000 people braved the cold and rainy weather to gather in a square in downtown Zagreb for a protest march against Sunday's vote, which they see as discriminatory.

Croatian border police have made their biggest ever seizure of undeclared cash, discovering almost five million euros ($7 million) in a truck during a routine check on the frontier with Serbia, the interior ministry said Thursday.

The 4.75 million euros was found at the Tovarnik border crossing in a truck with Slovenian registration on Tuesday, the ministry said in a statement.

Croatian war veterans on Monday prevented top officials including Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic from joining a march to commemorate the anniversary of the 1991 fall of Vukovar at the start of the Yugoslav wars.

The observance was held amid growing tensions between Croatians and minority Serbs in the eastern city sparked by the introduction of bilingual signs on public buildings -- written in the Cyrillic alphabet for Serbs alongside the names in the Latin alphabet for Croats.

Gale-force winds hit northern Croatia on Monday, leaving one man dead and at least a dozen people injured and disrupting road and sea traffic.

Along the northern Adriatic coast, winds were gusting up to 221 kilometers (136 miles) an hour, halting ferry services and closing bridges linking the islands of Krk and Pag, officials said.

The fate of hundreds of people who went missing during the 1991-95 war between Serbia and Croatia must be addressed before both countries can normalize relations, visiting Croatian President Ivo Josipovic said Wednesday.

"The problem of missing persons is a major one both in moral and legal terms," Josipovic told reporters on his first visit to Serbia since last year's election of conservative President Tomislav Nikolic.

The Croatian government on Thursday moved to comply with the European Union's extradition and arrest rules, ending a row that saw the bloc's newest member face possible sanctions barely after joining.

"We have reached a compromise solution," Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic told a cabinet session.

Croatia vowed Wednesday to bring its extradition and arrest rules speedily in line with EU law following a row that saw the bloc's newest member face sanctions barely after joining.

"We will swiftly take all measures to make the law in compliance with European law," Croatian Justice Minister Orsat Miljenic said at a brief news conference held with the European Union's justice commissioner Viviane Reding.

Weapons including rocket launcher parts being smuggled in containers were seized by Croatian customs officials on Friday amid claims the arms came from Serbia.

The defense ministry confirmed to Agence France Presse the discovery of the illegal arms in the northern Adriatic port of Rijeka and said in a statement that "competent military experts were called to establish the kind of military equipment" found there.