President Zoran Milanovic said that the State Attorney’s Office (DORH) stole the investigation into the suspicious procurement of medical equipment that led to the arrest of former Health Minister Vili Beros, but added that the European Public Prosecutor’s Office should not be treated as a "sacred cow".

“This case was stolen, it was taken away from the EPPO. Let’s not turn it into a golden calf or a sacred cow. It is an investigative body that is doing its job,” Milanovic said on public broadcaster HRT on Tuesday.

He criticized the State Attorney-General Ivan Turudic’s decision to transfer the investigation into the Beros-Petrac case to the USKOK anti-corruption office and not the EPPO.

“I would not mind DORH handling the case, but not under Turudic’s leadership”

“The principle of procedural expediency says that any reasonable and responsible person would transfer the case to the EPPO if there was even a minimal level of trust. Don’t get involved in a jurisdictional dispute, but say: ‘You’ll deal with it? Fine, we do not have the staff and resources anyway. Get on with your work’. That is concealment,” said Milanovic.

He clarified that he would not mind DORH handling the case, but not under Turudic’s leadership. “Turudic was brutally enforced by (Prime Minister) Andrej Plenkovic, with some obediently raising their hands in support. This is the reality, and as long as this reality is not forgotten, I will not get tired.”

Regarding the procurement of ECMO devices during the term of his government, for which the independent presidential candidate Marija Selak-Raspudic accused him, Milanovic replied that after ten years he had nothing more to say.

“As far as I remember, there was a commission of the Ministry of Health that demanded the procurement of 40 devices. I thought that was excessive, but I never received a satisfactory answer. Let the person concerned explain,” he said.

A month before the presidential election in which he is running for a second term, Milanovic said he had by far the most experience and knowledge for the office compared to his rivals. “My knowledge is incomparably greater when it comes to state affairs than the cumulative knowledge of all my challengers, with all due respect.”

“Primorac is supposed to be Plenkovic’s Trojan horse”

Referring to the candidate of the ruling HDZ party, Dragan Primorac, who according to polls is his most likely opponent in a second round, Milanovic described him as a pioneer of Tito (Josip Broz, late president of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia), who is supposed to be Plenkovic’s Trojan horse. “But now he is a political creature who, together with Plenkovic, is supposed to take over what Plenkovic has not yet taken over in Croatia.”

In the event of his re-election for another five years, Milanovic announced that he would ask Plenkovic to resume discussions on national security and defence issues.

“For three years, I have been calling for the constitutional bodies to meet to discuss these issues, which are not allowed to be discussed in public. These calls have been ignored… while high-ranking military officers are summoned to participate in political skirmishes in parliament. We must stand firmly against this.”

When asked about his campaign slogan “The President for the President”, Milanovic confirmed that he was aware that former President Franjo Tudjman had used the same slogan in 1997.