The former Prime Minister and president of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), Ivo Sanader, made an opening statement at the Zagreb County Court on Thursday following the joinder of two indictments against him, one in the Hypo bank loan case and the other in the INA-MOL case.
Sanader categorically dismissed all the charges against him, saying it was not clear to him why anyone would give him money for decisions that were not made by himself alone but at the highest political level.
The entire indictment is based on insinuations by the owner of the DIOKI petrochemical company, Robert Jezic, and was uncritically accepted by the State Attorney's Office. The prosecution did not provide any evidence in favour of the defence, the accused said.
The case file does not contain a statement by the board chairman of the Hungarian oil company MOL, Zsolt Hernadi, who allegedly gave Sanader 10 million euros in bribes to secure a dominant position for MOL in the Croatian oil company INA, he added.
According to Sanader, MOL officials have also dismissed Jezic's claim that a portion of the bribes for Sanader was paid into Jezic's account.
"I have nothing to do with the money in Jezic's account," Sanader said, describing the whole case as "a social farce of incredible proportions" in which a witness even accused himself in order to have a former prime minister convicted.
"We want to prove and find out who paid five million euros to Jezic's Swiss firm and why, and what happened between international oil companies with which Jezic's DIOKI did business," Sanader said, adding that considering the evidence at hand the court should have rejected all the fabrications and suspended the proceedings rather than issue the indictment.
Sanader said that he would prove in the course of the trial that all the people involved in the conclusion of the disputed agreement with MOL, namely members of the government, the HDZ and its coalition partners, were people with integrity who would never have voted against national interests.
"The agreement with MOL was beneficial and not harmful, and it made it possible for Croatia to have nearly the same influence with 44 per cent of the INA shares as it did in 2003 when it had 75 per cent," the former PM said.
In conclusion, Sanader said that he had performed all his duties the best he could and that he was very proud of the period in his life when he was twice elected as prime minister.
"Could I have made a mistake? Of course I could, but I did not do what the prosecution accuses me of," Sanader said. He added that he had spent a full 11 months in custody innocent and that it only reinforced his intention to prove his innocence.
