President Zoran Milanovic said on Friday that "the timing the Supreme Court had chosen to deliver its final verdict in the Fimi Media corruption case was unusual," state agency Hina reported.

The president believes that the ruling had been delivered earlier and that it was published on Wednesday, “as if they had been blackmailed”.

The ruling against the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) was evidently written earlier, and it seems as if they were blackmailed, said Milanovic, adding that not all the judiciary is under the clout of the HDZ. “There are people who have always worked for themselves.”

The judgement was kept in a drawer and made public only a day or two before the appointment of the new Supreme Court president, Milanovic said, wondering why it had not been announced two months ago. “I do not know whether these things are within the court president’s discretion, and if they are, this is then a dangerous weapon and an efficient tool of manipulation.”

Asked whether the HDZ should apologize to the public over the Fimi Media case, the president said that he did not know.

On the one hand, this has nothing to do with (current HDZ leader and Prime Minister Andrej) Plenkovic, but on the other hand it has something to do with some current officials who were the incumbents at the time relevant to the indictment, said Milanovic.

He admitted that if he were an HDZ member, he would be revolted by the fact that someone had written a ruling and shelved it, using that to obtain something.