The Office for the Prevention of Corruption and Organised Crime (USKOK) on Friday reported on its web site that it had issued an indictment against former Prime Minister Ivo Sanader, for allegedly receiving 10 million euros to help the Hungarian company MOL assume the management rights of the Croatian oil company INA, adding that if proven guilty, Sanader should compensate the Croatian state for the kickbacks he received in this case.
The indictment, filed with the Zagreb County Court, alleges that in early 2008 Sanader in his capacity of Croatian Prime Minister had agreed with a senior executive of the MOL management at their meetings in Zagreb and Budapest that he would see to it that the planned amendments to the shareholders' agreement for INA would enable MOL to have a dominant influence over INA.
Sanader should have also agreed with the MOL executive about the divesture of the loss-making gas division from INA and its takeover by Croatia.
In order to accomplish what was agreed, Ivo Sanader used his authority as the Prime Minister to impose his prepared conclusions on key elements of the said agreements, although he was aware that they were not in the interest of the Republic of Croatia and the agreements were concluded on 30 January 2009 whereby MOL's requests were fully granted, according to the USKOK's indictment.
USKOK also files a motion for stripping Sanader of his immunity as a member of parliament from the prosecution in this case.
It proposes that within 15 days upon the adoption a final guilty verdict Sanader should be ordered to pay back the gain he acquired through this criminal offence.
Former Deputy Prime Minister Damir Polancec had also been a suspect in the case, but USKOK recently gave up prosecuting him because it had not found any evidence of Polancec aiding and abetting Sanader in the abuse of office.
According to USKOK, an investigation against the senior executive in MOL is still under way.
As for this case, the copies of collected evidence were presented to the Hungarian Chef State Prosecutor Peter Polt on 21 September 2011, USKOK said.
The Croatian prosecutorial authorities have not revealed the identity of that senior executive, but it has been established that it is Zsolt hernadi whose questioning has been requested by the Croatian prosecutorial authorities in Hungary. The Croatian request for his interview was dismissed but an agreement was reportedly reached on transferring the prosecution of Hernadi to Hungary.
