ZAGREB

Banned Croatian player a reminder of need to halt hate speech

Sport officials call for co-operation between all stakeholders to continue efforts to stop hate speech and fan violence.

As Croatia takes to the field in the 2014 World Cup, it does so without one of its veteran players.

The Pride parade, staged under the slogan ‘On the Right Side of the History’, saw protesters march through Zagreb on Saturday and hold a celebration in a city-centre park.

The court in Zagreb on Friday confirmed that Sanader would go to jail but reduced the sentence from ten years to eight and a half.

Sanader, who was the country's premier from 2003 to 2009, was convicted of taking bribes from Hungarian oil group MOL in exchange for allowing it to take a dominant position in Croatian oil firm INA.

Croatia's first low-cost airline company, Dalmatian, starts functioning on June 30 after long years of preparation.

Foreign minister Vesna Pusic told a high-profile summit that Zagreb is dedicated to supporting wartime rape and sexual assault victims – despite the fact there have been few convictions in Croatia.

“The day of the great reckoning has arrived,” announced the headline in daily newspaper 24 Sata, reflecting the excitement and anticipation in Croatia as the national team prepare to face the five-time world champions at the start of the biggest tournament in football on Thursday.

Protesters rallied in front of the cathedral in Zagreb against Catholic bishops’ alleged ‘glorification’ of the homecoming of recently-released Bosnian Croat war criminal Dario Kordic.

“The indictment against Hernadi has been confirmed and he will be tried in absentia,” Zagreb county court spokesperson Kresimir Devcic told Reuters news agency on Tuesday.

The alleged graft took place in 2008-9, when the Croatian government put its shares of the state oil company INA on the market. MOL bought 22.15 per cent of INA’s shares, thus becoming the biggest stakeholder.

Croatia looks to make its mark at World Cup

ZAGREB – Flowers in the colors of the Croatian “Chessboard” flag and shaped in the form of the U symbol of the Ustasha, Croatian pro-Nazi regime responsible for massive killings of Serbs, Jews and Roma in concentration camps during World War II, have been planted at the Jasenovac Memorial Site in central Croatia.