Although Jugobanka has not been able to manage its assets in Croatia for three decades, the Commercial Court in Split is asking the bank for seven hundred million euros.
This is the last and strongest blow to the Serbian bank, which should settle Croatia’s claims on the basis of old foreign currency savings of citizens.
Jugobanka filed the most lawsuits against the state of Croatia for the return of real estate, branches and resorts, and several against companies there that took loans and never returned them as Rijeka’s “3rd of May” Company. Everything was resolved in favor of the Croatian state, as well as the latter – after the lawsuit of Croatia against Jugobanka.
The decision according to which Jugobanka should pay 700,000,000 euros to Croatia, is only the last in a series of decisions to the detriment of one of the largest Serbian banks, according to the Deposit Insurance Agency.
According to the legal representatives of the bankrupt Jugobanka, the whole process was, to put it mildly, strange from the beginning – from initiating the so-called secondary bankruptcy to repealing the previously made decision to present evidence and hold a hearing, RTS reports.
“If you get a court decision in a court case in which no evidence was presented, then you cannot treat it other than as a fabricated court decision that should serve as a kind of argument or something that will, in fact, cover an indisputable fact, and that is, the Croatian judiciary confiscated the property of Serbian companies in Croatia,” points out lawyer Ivan Simic, legal representative of Jugobanka.
The question arises as to where Croatia will collect the receivables from, bearing in mind that Jugobanka no longer has assets there by the decisions of the Croatian authorities.
“You are suing the property of Jugobanka, for which you have not previously determined what it represents in Croatia itself, precisely because that property has been confiscated and stolen several times,” Simic added.
What Serbian institutions can do?
The Deposit Insurance Agency, which is the bankruptcy trustee of the banks in bankruptcy, says that they will continue to take all available legal actions in order to protect the assets and property rights of Jugobanka in Croatia.
In this case, the Agency and Jugobanka have at their disposal extraordinary legal remedies – a request for revision and a constitutional complaint that will be submitted within the legal deadline, and in case of unfavorable outcome of these proceedings, proceedings will be initiated before the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
The expected first step of Croatia is to initiate a procedure for the collection of court costs, when our judiciary will be asked to recognize the decision of the Croatian court.
Lawyer Simic believes that the Serbian judiciary will be able to respond to such challenges.
However, the decision of the European Court of Human Rights on the exemption does not help us – with the view that Croatia was not a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms until 1997, and that therefore all laws and bylaws passed by Croatia until then they cannot be the subject of their consideration, B92 reports.
