CROATIAN POLICE DENY THAT KUTLE WAS IN CONSTANT TOUCH

ZAGREB, Feb 4 (Hina) - Until the day that he was arrested, we could not contact Miroslav Kutle, nor could we establish his whereabouts, head of the Crime Police, Zdravko Senicnjak told a press conference denying allegations made by Kutle's spokeswoman. On Thursday, Kutle's spokeswoman, Branka Bolkovic reported that Kutle had been in constant contact with the police since Monday. Senicnjak however, stressed that the police had undertaken a series of operative measures in an effort to disclose Kutle's whereabouts seeing that he was not in Zagreb. "Because we did not know where he was, a summons to appear for questioning was handed over to Globus Group's secretary who stated that Kutle was aware of the summons however, due to a business trip he would not be able to attend on Wednesday as noted in the summons, but on Thursday", he said. Because he did not turn up on Thursday either, we put out a warrant for his arrest, Senicnjak said, noting that the first contact with Kutle was established only after his son had given the police the number of his mobile phone. Kutle advised that he was on a business trip in Slovenia and that he would be returning to Croatia later that afternoon. About 5 pm, Kutle was arrested at the border crossing in Bregana and taken to Zagreb police headquarters. About 6:40 pm he was brought before the Investigative Judge. Senicnjak said that the Zagreb police had been after Kutle for virtually six years. "We were the first to file for charges, had they been carried through in 1994, the Tisak affair may have been avoided, however, the reason why this didn't occur at the time does not lie with the police", Senicnjak concluded. (hina) sp