Nenad Nesic, who is accused of taking bribes during his time as head of a public company, has paid a large sum in bail to have certain restrictive measures lifted.
Bosnian former security minister Nenad Nesic. Photo: N1/Faruk Zametica.
Bosnia’s former security minister, Nenad Nesic, has paid a bail of 1.37 million Bosnian marks, or just over 700,000 euros, in a case in which he is suspected of high-level corruption, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina said on Tuesday.
In return, a ban leaving the municipality where his address is registered or leaving the country were lifted. The ban on meeting certain individuals stays in place.
“The accepted bail will be cancelled and that the suspect will be ordered in custody should he not respond to a summons by either the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina or the Prosecutor’s Office, without justifying his absence or if any other legal ground for his custody appears against him,” the court said in a statement.
Nesic and six others were arrested in December last year, after which he and two others were given five months of detention.
They were arrested over suspected corruption during his tenure as director of the public road company in Bosnia’s mainly Serb-populated Republika Srpska entity. He is suspected of exerting pressure on road maintenance companies between 2016 and 2020 to do business with a company called Legend.
It is alleged that the companies were compelled to purchase materials at prices higher than their market value. The prosecutors claim Nesic took a million Bosnian marks, over 500,000 euros, in bribes during his four-year tenure at the public road company. The director of Legend, Mladen Lucic, brother of Bosnia’s former human rights minister, Milos Lucic, was arrested together with Nesic.
Nesic was security minister when he was arrested but resigned in January. His successor has not been appointed yet.