The name of Zagreb businessman Zeljko Selendic was first mentioned in the trial of six men charged with the 2008 murder of Pukanic and his associate Niko Franjic by Montenegrin businessman Ratko Knezevic, one of the key witnesses for the prosecution, who said that Selendic was the first person who conveyed to Pukanic a message from the so-called tobacco cartel asking him to stop writing, in exchange for a hefty payment, about tobacco trafficking that was allegedly approved by the Montenegrin authorities.

"I have nothing to do with that and I don't know Knezevic," Selendic told the panel of judges presided by Judge Ivana Krsul.

He added that after Knezevic's testimony he had considered suing the Montenegrin businessman, but eventually decided against it because he was used to the media publishing "all kinds of nonsense".

Describing his relationship with Pukanic, Selendic said that they were friends, that Pukanic visited him at his home, and that he had last seen him a year before his assassination.

Selendic said that Pukanic had never complained to him about being in danger or about receiving threats, nor had he ever mentioned Knezevic to him.

Selendic said that he had never talked with Pukanic about his testimony against the tobacco mafia in Italy, where, according to the media, Pukanic told Italian investigators that Selendic had conveyed to him a message from "Montenegrin friends" in Monaco asking him to stop writing against Montenegrin Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic in exchange for five million German marks.

Answering a question from the defence, Selendic said that he had never met Djukanovic or the late Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic.

After Selendic's testimony, the court heard expert witnesses who examined the rifle which the accused Bojan Guduric allegedly was to have shot Pukanic with in case the explosive device planted near his car failed to go off.

Expert witness Marijana Macan confirmed that traces of several persons were found on the rifle, but that it was possible to identify only Guduric's DNA because the other traces were scarce.

She said that his DNA could not have been transferred to the rifle from some other object, which means that Guduric had to have held the rifle.

Along with Robert Matanic, the first indictee, also indicted for Pukanic's and Franjic's murder are Luka Matanic, Amir Mafalani, Zeljko Milovanovic, Bojan Guduric, and Slobodan Djurovic. The prosecution alleges that Djurovic served as a link with Sreten Jocic, aka Joca Amsterdam, who allegedly paid EUR 1.5 million to have Pukanic killed.

Jocic is standing trial for the same crime in Belgrade, alongside Milovanovic and Milenko Kuzmanovic.

The Zagreb trial continues on May 24 with the questioning of the key witness Tomislav Marjanovic, who will testify behind closed doors.