Police on Wednesday launched an operation in cooperation with the Uskok anti-corruption office targetting a number of companies and about 30 persons for siphoning money via fictitious invoices, including Ana Karamarko, wife of former HDZ president Tomislav Karamarko.

The suspects are being arrested and their homes and offices searched, unofficial sources said. Neither the police nor USKOK have made a comment yet.

The persons in question and their companies are suspected of charging non-existent services via fictitious invoices and tax fraud from 2017 until mid-2019.

Vecernji List daily said they were suspected of illegally gaining 20 million kuna and defrauding the state of 11 million kuna.

According to unofficial sources, Ana Karamarko’s company Drimia paid 400,000 kuna for fictitious services.

In 2016, because of Drimia’s cooperation with Jozo Petrovic, a consultant for the Hungarian energy group MOL, Tomislav Karamarko stepped down as deputy prime minister and HDZ president.

(€1 = 7.55 kuna)