"The proposed bill is not finished yet and for the time being I cannot say what solutions will be offered, but we in the DC believe that the bill need not list totalitarian ideologies it will apply to," Skare-Ozbolt said responding to the question whether the term totalitarianism would cover fascism, nazism and bolshevism as had been reported by the media.
She said that the Ministry of Justice, which the government instructed last week to draft amendments to the Criminal Code, still did not have "a clear vision of how the proposal will look".
Skare-Ozbolt said that her party made a clear distinction between antifascism and bolshevism, and that it was totally pointless to compare the two ideologies. She added that the DC would launch an initiative within the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts to bring together scholars to give a scientific assessment of historical events.
Commenting on her visit to a Republican convention in the United States on the invitation of the British Conservative Party, Skare-Ozbolt said that European people's parties, whose leaders attended the convention, have "a very positive attitude towards Croatia".
"Croatia received praises and assurances that it will be given an opportunity to join the European Union in 2007," she said.
Skare-Ozbolt announced that she would report Zagreb lawyer Ante Nobilo to the Bar Association following his accusations that she had used her influence as justice minister to have his client Miroslav Kutle sentenced to six and a half years in prison, that the whole trial was rigged and that the verdict was known before it was written.
"I did not intervene, nor will I ever intervene in any court case," the justice minister said.
The weekly Globus carried an article in its latest issue about a letter Nobilo had sent to Kutle in prison, accusing the justice minister and a number of state and judicial officials of influencing the length of the sentence.