SDP party vice-president Mirela Ahmetovic, on Friday described a report by the Centre for Information Resilience (CIR) on the alleged support of Russian bots for President Zoran Milanovic as a serious attempt at manipulation and suspected that it was commissioned by Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic.

At a press conference organised ahead of the second round of the presidential election, Ahmetovic described the report as a “strange and flawed analysis” that “contains nonsense, such as declaring a living person, journalist Darko Lesinger, a bot just because he is critical of Dragan Primorac.”

“It is outrageous that a minister legitimises an unsigned and false report”

The run-off election will take place on Sunday. Milanovic, who is supported by the SDP party and its partners, is running against Primorac, who is supported by the ruling HDZ party and its partners.

The report accuses mostly right-wing or radical right-wing websites, which do not have a single positive article about Milanovic, of campaigning in his favour, Ahmetovic said.

She also responded to a statement by the Minister of Culture and Media, Nina Obuljen-Korzinek, who said that the data in the report appears credible and that if true, it should be a cause for great concern. “It is outrageous that a minister legitimises an unsigned and false report,” Ahmetovic said.

“The HDZ is most dangerous when it is wounded”

She assessed the CIR report as “an attempt by the HDZ to save itself from an electoral disaster,” but added that this attempt will fail because “Croatian citizens are not stupid and understand that this operation is not connected with good intentions.”

“Since Andrej Plenkovic is indiscriminately labelling us as Russian players for reasons only he knows, I can express my suspicion that the report was commissioned by Plenkovic and paid for from HDZ’s black-bag funds, to help their ridiculous candidate who lies as soon as he opens his mouth,” Ahmetovic said.

She called on voters to support Milanovic because the HDZ is most dangerous when it is wounded.