The paper said there were no secret negotiations between the government and MOL as reported by some Croatian media.
It added that the Croatian government had not contacted MOL even formally, even though Economy Minister Ivan Vrdoljak last week called for urgently beginning negotiations.
The government last week decided that Vrdoljak would lead its team in the negotiations. As the second largest shareholder in INA, the Croatian government and its strategic partner MOL should agree on INA's strategic goals and future as well as on what is expected of the Croatian company in the coming period.
Vrdoljak said last week that in order to agree the strategic goals, it was necessary to open negotiations on INA's story over the last ten years and that the topics of discussion with MOL should be corporate management, expense control, the refining, wholesale and retail of oil products, and the gas business.
MOL told Hina on August 1 that it was willing to begin constructive negotiations on INA with the Croatian government, after an unnamed MOL official said earlier that day that the Hungarian company was willing to sell its stake in INA. MOL said on that occasion that it could not comment on rumours on any business decisions.
Nepszabadsag said INA-MOL relations came into the spotlight again after Croatia's anti-corruption bureau USKOK said it was still investigating MOL CEO Zsolt Hernadi on suspicion of bribing former Croatian Prime Minister Ivo Sanader in exchange for management rights in INA. The probe was stopped last December because Hernadi was out of reach to Croatia's judicial bodies, but this changed when Croatia joined the European Union on July 1.
MOL denies giving Sanader EUR 5 million in bribes, for which Sanader was sentenced last year to ten years' imprisonment pending appeal.