According to the Croatian media today, Čedo Prodanović, the lawyer of Ivo Sanader, is busy preparing an appeal to the court decision of a few days ago, whereby the former prime minister is to serve ten years in jail for corruption and organized crime. Predictable enough. What has caught my attention, though, is that the lawyer is threatening to go all the way to Strasbourg with his appeal. So, we are talking about Sanader’s human rights, no less. Thus we may end up in the same court if the highest court in Croatia does not accept my appeal to decisions of lower courts in Istria concerning my insult of the mayor of Motovun, in which I likened him to a cockroach for his predilection to work in the dark and behind closed doors. Undemocratically, in short. And the mayor was only following instructions of the governor of Istria, who was following instructions of the then prime minister concerning golf development bent on the abuse of land in the government’s hands. To wit, our two appeals will have a common base even though Sanader has never been charged with corruption and organized crime in connection with golf development in Istria, Dalmatia, and Croatia as a whole. As paradoxes go, this promises to be a cute one. Human rights, anyone?

Addendum I (November 26, 2012)

As soon as I posted this piece on the World Wide Web, I copied it and sent it to Stefan Füle, the European Union’s commissioner for enlargement. I sent him the piece about the former prime minister’s verdict a few days earlier (“Ten Years Only,” November 20, 2012). After searching my website for a minute or two, I also sent him one of my letters to Sanader while he was still in power (“Continuing Concerns with Croatia’s Democratic Record: A Letter to Croatian Prime Minister Ivo Sanader,” May 27, 2009). Nothing was done about human rights in Croatia on account of the last letter, it goes without saying. In fact, the law pertaining to libel and insult has gotten only tougher in the meanwhile. Will anything be done about it on account of my letter to Füle, though? Of course not. I am not writing to any of these potentates to achieve anything in particular. I am only keeping the record straight, and the record is abominable so far. Democracy is for the birds, as every fool knows by now. The only difference between us is that I can also prove it.

Addendum II (December 5, 2012)

As Stefan Füle hails from Slovakia, I could not but remember him when I went through this year’s Corruption Perception Index compiled by Transparency International. Of all countries, Croatia and Slovakia share the sixty-second place in the ranking. Bingo! Which is why he must be among the best politicians of the European Union to appreciate corruption. As well as organized crime, it goes without saying. How lucky Croatia has been to have him as the commissioner for enlargement! Olli Rehn, his predecessor, hails from Finland, which tops the ranking together with Denmark and New Zealand. He could not but have despaired of Croatia’s abysmal ranking. Lucky Croatia, indeed.