In a preliminary hearing in the Planinska corruption scandal the defence counsel for former Prime Minister Ivo Sanader requested another adjournment and asked that the case be combined with the Fimi Media trial.
A panel of judges will probably decide on the request next week and then fix a new date for the proceedings to continue.
Sanader's counsel explained that the Criminal Procedures Law foresees that several cases against an accused can be combined into a single proceeding.
The national anti-corruption agency (USKOK) however objected to the request as did counsel for another accused in this case -- Stjepan Fiolic who has pleaded guilty.
After being arrested in April Fiolic admitted to selling a building in Zagreb's Planinska street for a trumped up price claiming that he retained the monies from the sale. However later he stated that he took around HRK 17 million to Sanader at the latter's request.
USKOK claims that Fiolic sold the building for a much higher price to another accused, Petar Cobankovic, who was the Croatian Democratic Union's (HDZ) minister of regional development at the time and that he was assisted in the deal to seel the building to the ministry by Sanader, Cobankovic and the building's owner, Mladen Mlinarevic who too is standing trial for the scandal.
Despite the confessions given in this case, Sanader claims that this is yet another in a series of trumped up political cases against him embarked on by state prosecutor Mladen Bajic in a "crusade war".
