Ivo Sanader

Zagreb County Court on Wednesday indefinitely extended custody of former Croatian Prime Minister Ivo Sanader.

His lawyers had filed a plea for him to be released from custody lasting almost four years.

Sanader has received a nine-year jail sentence in a first instance ruling for using private marketing companies to siphon off public funds from state institutions and bodies.

Zagreb county court has scheduled the start of Sanader's retrial for September 7 on charges of abuse of office, war profiteering and bribery.

Sanader's eight-and-a-half-year sentence was revoked by the constitutional court on Monday due to procedural errors.

The constitutional court's decision this week to revoke the conviction of Sanader for bribery and illegal profiteering and order a retrial will not damage the electoral chances of his party, the centre-right Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, at polls due late this year or in early 2016, analysts told BIRN.

Croatia's constitutional court on Monday revoked the verdicts that sentenced former ex-premier Sanader to eight and a half years in prison for abuse of office, war profiteering and bribery.

The verdicts were overturned because of procedural errors, the court said, and the legal process against Sanader will now restart at Zagreb county court.

Croatia's Justice Ministry has confirmed plans to seek the extradition from Australia of Predrag Japranin, a Croatian Serb accused of war crimes in Croatia in 1991.

The Bureau for Combating Corruption and Organised Crime, USKOK, filed its latest indictment against Bozidar Kalmeta, the mayor of the Croatian coastal town of Zadar, on Friday.

This follows the anti-fraud body's indictments of Zagreb mayor Milan Bandic and former Sisak-Moslavina county prefect Marina Lovric Merzel on Wednesday.

Croatia's main opposition party, the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, on Wednesday accused the government of selling the insurance company Croatia Osiguranje for a low price.

The mayor of the Croatian capital has been released from custody after a judge accepted an offer of 2 million euro in bail.

Earlier this month, Bandic offered a house worth around 750,000 euro for his release from detention.

Eleven others arrested in the same case have also been released from custody with bails ranging from 13,000 to 587,000 euro.

Berlin conference "meant to show Germany's dominance"

BANJA LUKA -- A conference dedicated to the Western Balkans, scheduled for August 28 in Berlin, is meant to show the dominance of Germany in this region, says Milorad Dodik.

“The EU promotes freedom of expression in its dialogues with enlargement countries and supports excellence in investigative journalism,” Lunacek said on Friday.

“Candidates and prospective candidates for EU membership must ensure journalists can do their job without fear of violence and intimidation,” she added