ZAGREB, Nov 13 (Hina) - Late President Tudjman's family has described Channel 4's feature on Croatia's first president as scandalous, saying "it is clearly obvious that there is no longer any measure or rule in the political reckoning
with Franjo Tudjman and his family."
ZAGREB, Nov 13 (Hina) - Late President Tudjman's family has
described Channel 4's feature on Croatia's first president as
scandalous, saying "it is clearly obvious that there is no longer
any measure or rule in the political reckoning with Franjo Tudjman
and his family."#L#
"It is simply a public lynching which is unparalleled in fair and
objective journalism and elementary political culture," the
Tudjman family said in Monday's statement in connection with the
feature which Croatian Television aired last Saturday.
The documentary which production company Newswatch sold Channel 4
contains claims to the effect that the Tudjman archives yielded
evidence on the theft of one billion dollars, Tudjman's
accountability for war crimes, and that former Croatian
authorities had sent General Tihomir Blaskic to the Hague war
crimes tribunal knowing who were the real culprits behind the 1993
massacre in the central Bosnian village of Ahmici.
"The British tv station's ten-minute feature, with no evidence
whatsoever, accuses Franjo Tudjman of allegedly stealing $100
million and pillaging the country," the Tudjman family says.
They remind that Croatia's state television (HTV) aired the feature
even after Finance Minister Mato Crkvenac publicly refuted the
"impudent imputation" by stating that the sum, deposited with a
Chase Manhattan bank account, had been legally used to settle
Croatia's foreign debts and financial duties.
"HTV nonetheless aired such a notorious lie," the family says,
adding that "by broadcasting that defamatory British feature, HTV
simply finished its continuous dirty work aimed at criminalising
the person and work of Franjo Tudjman and his family." "The quite
obvious manipulation with criminal charges against some members of
the family" are along the same line," they add.
"We are therefore forced to seek legal protection in the belief that
the Croatian judiciary won't succumb to pressures and political
dictates," Tudjman's wife Ankica, sons Miroslav and Stjepan, and
daughter Nevenka say in the statement.
One of the authors of the contested documentary, John Cookson, told
Croatia's largest circulation daily Vecernji list on Monday that
"the small production company Newswatch inserted sensationalist
accusations against Tudjman in the documentary to make a better
sale to Channel Four, but most Croatian media realised that this
British tv station had come across new sensationalist documents in
the President's Office."
Cookson told the daily the tv crew did not get from incumbent
President Stipe Mesic's Office any documents which would be new
about Croatia. "The only original aspect of the documentary is
video footage of the archive" as the British crew was the first to
videotape the sealed door behind which are transcripts of secretly
taped conversations, he said.
Vecernji list also brings Cookson's statement that "the claim on
Tudjman's accountability for war crimes is based on a variety of
transcripts of secretely taped conversations from which transpires
that Blaskic is innocent, but was sent to The Hague nonetheless."
Cookson further says the "accusation that Franjo Tudjman pillaged
Croatia for one billion dollars is not based on transcripts from the
Tudjman archives, but World Bank estimates. The World Bank assessed
that Tudjman probably stole six billion dollars."
Cookson did not say why, if he had the World Bank estimate, in the
documentary he stated that Tudjman had stolen one billion dollars.
(hina) ha jn