THE VERDICT OF THE CENTURY: The founders of Croatian Democratic Union sentenced for life, Croatia in shock

After two years long trial, the verdict was given for the murder of businessman Stjepan Djurekovic

Higher court in Munich, Germany, has reached a verdict today regarding the trial of Josip Perkovic and Zdravko Mustac, suspected of a murder of Croatian businessman and the director of INA oil company, Stjepan Djurekovic. They were both found guilty for accomplice of the murder, and were sentenced to life time in prison. 

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Djurekovic was murdered in 28th Jul 1983 in the garage in Wolfratshausen, near Munich.

This is a second sentence reached in this case.

On the same court in 2008, Croatian citizen Krunoslav Prates was sentenced to life in prison for helping the murder. It was determined that Prates gave keys of the garage to Perkovic where  the Djurekovic was killed, and he passed the key forward to the unknown perpetrators.

Prates was a Perkovic contributor, and he followed Djurekovic movement over Germany. Mustac was Perkovic's superior in the State Security Service.

The prosecusion in the final statement remained with the motif for murder, which is removing Djurekovic as a witness of financial manipulations in oil company INA, which was under ownership of the state, where he worked as a manager until he left for Germany.

Anton Noblo, the defender of the accused Perkovic, tried to rebut the claims, in his final statements. According to his words, Djurekovic was a secret agent of the German intelligence service, to which he gave classified military information about oil supplies of former Yugoslavian nationalistic army. The defenders claimed that the murder was committed by Counter-intelligence service, in cooperation with State Security Service.

Entering the European Union, the agreement about handing over the suspects began to apply to Croatia, and that is why Perkovic and Mustac were delivered to Germany in the start of 2014.

The trial should have come to a close in April 2015, but it was prolonged because of the great number of documents which arrived from the State archives of Croatia. It was also prolonged due to often unresponsive witnesses, and technical preparations because many key witnesses gave their statements over video connection. 

MILANOVC SHOCKED BY THE VERDICT

The leader of Social Democratic Party, Zoran Milanovic, said that he is shocked by the verdict for Perkovic and Mustac.

- If its true, those men received the mildest possible sentence they could get - said Milanovic, and added that those were the people who founded the Croatian Democratic Union and the men who got the passport for the first president Franjo Tudjman.

- They had his trust, as well as the trust of the Gojko Susak, Karamarko and other Union members. I am shocked that the people, who were the founders and closest collaborators to them, were presented as the executioners of the secret service - he pointed out .

(Telegraf.co.uk / source: jutarnji.hr)