The ruling HDZ party on Friday rejected 'collective responsibility' of its members or 'any connection between its current leadership and individual acts that were subject to a trial' in which the HDZ was found responsible for the criminal activities of its former leader Ivo Sanader and other co-defendants.

“Without going into the merit of the ruling, the HDZ disclaims any collective responsibility of its members or any connection between the party’s current leadership and individual acts that were subject to this trial. We also underline that the HDZ fully supports judicial independence,” the party said in a statement.

Sanader and his co-defendants in the Fimi Media case were charged with siphoning around HRK 70 million (€9.3 million) from state-owned companies and institutions through the Fimi Media marketing agency.

Zagreb County Court today sentenced Sanader to eight years in prison pending appeal while former HDZ treasurer Mladen Barisic and accountant Branka Pavosevic were sentenced to two years and 10 months and to 16 months in prison respectively. The HDZ was fined HRK 3.5 million and ordered to pay back HRK 14.6 million into the state budget.

The court found the party, into whose slush fund some of the siphoned money had allegedly ended up, “responsible” in the case.

The HDZ recalls that a retrial in the Fimi Media case started in 2016, a year after the Supreme Court quashed the sentencing verdict from 2013. In its decision, the Supreme Court cited which evidence-related actions needed to be taken and which facts needed to be determined in a retrial, it said.

“The County Court should have presented the already presented evidence and removed significant breaches of rules of criminal procedure which in the Supreme Court’s opinion had affected the regularity of the establishment of facts in the initial trial,” the HDZ believes.

Since in the retrial evidence proposed by the HDZ’s legal representatives was not admitted, the party believes the court did not act in line with the instructions from the Supreme Court’s ruling, noting that it would appeal against the verdict.

Earlier in the day, the party’s attorney Vladimir Teresak announced an appeal, stressing that the party had been convicted for actions by its former leader and accountant and that the current party leadership and members “have nothing to do with criminal activities of natural persons.”