I advocate the position that the rule of law must function and that each institution should do its share of the job and be responsible for it, President Mesic said on Wednesday after being asked to comment on the request by the state prosecution to be given the greenlight for launching criminal proceedings against a member of parliament, Branimir Glavas, suspected of having committed war crimes against civilians in the eastern city of Osijek in 1991.
Mesic, however, told reporters in Zagreb today that "one should have definitely responded earlier, and this is only evidence that we have not functioned as a law-based state in which everybody should be equal before the law.
Consequently, today we must resolve something which had not been addressed promptly when it happened, Mesic said answering reporters' questions while he toured the 'Chromos' factory of varnish and paint products in Zagreb.
The leader of the Democratic Centre (DC) party, Vesna Skare-Ozbolt said that she had got an impression that the plans for launching criminal proceedings against Glavas were actually plans to settle accounts with this local power-monger in eastern Croatia rather than a wish to establish the truth.
Skare-Ozbolt told a news conference in Zagreb she could not agree with Glavas on many things but she wondered why nothing had been done until now.
In this context she recalled that suspicions that Glavas had committed war crimes appeared for the first time in 1991.
Asked by reporters whether she could have done anything while she filled the post of the Justice Minister until recently, the DC chief said that she could not act in this direction as this job was within the remit of the state prosecution and the police.
Zlatko Kramaric of the Social Liberal Party (HSLS) told a news conference in Osijek that "nothing should be prejudged in the case of Glavas.
Any attempt to politicise the case will not help efforts to solve the case but would further complicate it, Kramaric said.
A parliamentary deputy of the Istrian Democratic Party (IDS), Damir Kajin, said in Pazin today, that his party's MPs would vote for lifting the immunity of Glavas so that criminal proceedings against him could be launched.
Slavonia (eastern Croatia) was exposed to the brutal aggression (by Serb forces), but it is also well known that some crimes which happened there were backed by some institutions under the control of the Croatian authorities, Kajin said.
"The crimes must be investigated, perpetrators punished, but before the completion of the investigation, nothing should be ascribed to anyone," Kajin said.