AMBASSADOR ZAJA: I'LL PROVE I AM INNOCENT AT COURT

ZAGREB, Oct 11 (Hina) - Marko Zaja, Croatian Ambassador to France, on Wednesday said he would prove through legal institutions that he had not committed any criminal act and that he did not inflict damage to the Foreign Ministry by reducing the Ministry's income by over 310,00 kuna. Zagreb police reported yesterday it had preferred charges against a former secretary of the ministry and the incumbent Croatian ambassador in Paris, Marko Zaja, suspected of having concluding a (business) contract to the detriment of the ministry. According to the police, in June 1998, Marko Zaja, who was the then acting secretary of the Foreign Ministry, concluded, although he was not authorised, an annex to the contract on the lease of a restaurant on the premises of the ministry. Under the annex, the lessee had to pay 500 kuna of the rent per month instead of the previous rent of 12,000 kuna. According to the police, the Ministry got less money by 11,500 kuna per month in the period from July 1998 to September this year, and it totalled 310,500 kuna. The police added that Zaja had no permit either from the ministry of the government for such a decision. Ambassador Zaja told Hina on Wednesday that he did not know that he had had to obtain the Government's consent for anything like that and that nobody had ever mentioned it to him. He added that he had decided to give the green light for a lower price for the lease following a petition of 120 employees with the ministry who had complained about bad food. Zaja asserted that the 'technical' board of directors from the Ministry had known of the annex to the agreement. "Let the law-based state function," Zaja said adding that nobody from the Foreign Ministry had contacted him following the pressed charges. (hina) jn ms