Bojan Guduric, an indictee in the trial for the murder of Nacional weekly co-owner Ivo Pukanic and his business associate Niko Franjic, was transferred to Croatia from Bosnia on Friday morning and admitted to Zagreb's Remetinec prison.
The Croatian police took over Guduric from Bosnia's border police at the border crossing at Slavonski Brod, and he was admitted to prison at 10.30 am, the head of the Office of the Police Director, Krunoslav Borovec, said.
Guduric's admission to prison officially completes the procedure of his extradition to Croatia. The Ministry of the Interior this morning removed Guduric's name from a list of wanted persons on its web site.
Apart from the charge of conspiring to kill and killing Pukanic, Guduric is also charged with a crime against public security, since an explosive device was detonated in the attack on Pukanic, causing great material damage.
In their announcement of Guduric's arrival in Croatia earlier this morning, the police also said that they would show footage of his extradition on the ministry's web site after 1 pm.
Shortly before the start of the trial for Pukanic's murder, Guduric turned himself in to the police in Banja Luka after he spent more than a year in hiding. In the course of the extradition procedure in Bosnia, he waived his right to appeal, asking to be transferred to Croatia, a decision the media speculate was motivated by his fear that his life could be in danger if he was transferred to Serbia.
He told Bosnian judicial authorities that he was not guilty of Pukanic's murder and that he believed that he would have a fair trial in Zagreb.
Serbia, too, had requested his extradition from Bosnian authorities, but its request was turned down.
Apart from Guduric, five other people are charged with conspiring to kill and killing Pukanic in October 2008. Pukanic's associate Niko Franjic was a collateral victim. Those other five indictees are cousins Robert and Luka Matanic, Amir Mafalani, Zeljko Milovanovic and Slobodan Djurovic. They are also charged with conspiring to kill two more people in the Zagreb area.
A parallel trial with the same charges will soon start in Belgrade, the indictees being Milovanovic, Milenko Kuzmanovic, and Sreten Jocic, who is believed to have paid 1.5 million euros to have Pukanic killed.
