As you say so well, “a spate of murders damages Croatia’s European ambition” (“Still a Balkan Country,” November 1, 2008). Which is why the Croatian government is now scrambling to improve its tarnished image. It is “them or us,” you quote Stipe Mesić, Croatia’s president. The murder of Ivo Pukanić, the editor of Nacional, a brazen and boastful weekly, by a car-bomb in central Zagreb electrified the whole nation, indeed. “A gifted journalist,” as you put it in your apt and pithy portrait of the man, he “operated in the Balkan twilight zone where criminals, politicians, intelligence officers, journalists, and lawyers meet to do business.” Alas, you forgot the intrepid businessmen, without whom the twilight zone would be barren! Besides, your article is marred by its inept title. It is good to remember a simple lesson of political geography: once a Balkan country, always a Balkan country!