Defence lawyers for former Prime Minister Ivo Sanader said that their client had rejected "with loathing" the charge of war profiteering at his first appearance before the Zagreb County Court on Friday.
"It was with loathing that he rejected the prosecution charge that he was a war profiteer, because at that time he was fighting for Croatia and held the rank of colonel," lawyer Cedo Prodanovic told reporters on his way out of the courthouse after the court upheld the first indictment against the former prime minister and former leader of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ).
Prodanovic said that the prosecution, keen on prosecuting Sanader even for crimes he had allegedly committed 17 years ago, resorted to the law under which crimes of war profiteering during the privatisation and ownership transformation process were not subject the statute of limitations. He said that the defence challenged the war profiteering charge by saying that it was a legal matter, and the court said the matter would be discussed at the trial.
The defence also challenged the charge that Sanader had received a commission for a loan granted to Croatia by Austrian Hypo bank.
"In a situation when a bank comes to a non-existent banking market and gives a favourable loan no other bank is willing to give, than it's the bank that should be paid a commission and not the other way round," Prodanovic said.
Another member of the defence team, Jadranka Slokovic, said that a preparatory hearing in the case was expected to be scheduled within the next two weeks, adding that the national anti-corruption office USKOK had overstepped its legal powers.
"The case file contains depositions of witnesses who were not heard during the investigation but were interviewed by USKOK after the investigation was completed. That shows that this will be a very tough job for us and I don't know if we have all guarantees for a fair trial," Slokovic said, adding that the defence also had against them the media, which she said had published certain materials that the defence did not have in their possession.
When asked about Sanader's health, the lawyers said that he was still using crutches because of pain in his leg. They said that it was most probably "a neglected injury" that had developed into an inflammation and had affected the ligaments.
After the two-hour closed hearing, Sanader was escorted back to Remetinec prison where he has been held since his extradition from Austria in July.
