Last Friday afternoon, five bids arrived at the office of the Privatization Fund for the concession for helicopter emergency medical services in Croatia. This was an international tender which has again case the little known business career of retired General Vladimir Zagorec into the spotlight.
Even though several distinguished world companies bid on this concession, representatives of those companies commented off the record for Nacional that this tender was only a formality and they are certain that in one month’s time, the commission will grant the concession to the Heli company.
The Heli company has been preparing for this tender for some time. The company publicly supported the organization model of helicopter emergency services, which for the most part was based on the Master’s thesis of retired General Vladimir Zagorec.
On 11 July 2003, Zagorec defended his thesis entitled “Proposed development of intervention air services” before the Faculty of Transport Sciences. In his thesis, he supported the centralization of all emergency helicopter services under a single management, which no European state has attempted to put into practice. By that model, the same helicopters would be used for emergency medical aid, border control and for putting out forest fires.
The Heli company intends to realize its project in cooperation with the distinguished helicopter manufacturer – Eurocopter. Those well informed in the business world have confirmed for Nacional that the fugitive Hrvoje Petrač lobbied on behalf of that company in the late 1990s. At that time, he brought Eurocopter reps Karl Meszaros and Wolfgang Sproesser. There are claims that Sproesser drafted a study on the possibility of using Eurocopter helicopters for emergency medical services needs, and Zagorec used part of this study in writing his Master’s thesis.
Heli company, which took over Zagorec’s model of establishing emergency services in co-ownership with the Austrian company Human Consult. Zagorec claims that he has nothing to do with either of these companies. However, Boris Galović, professor at the Faculty of Transport Sciences, who was a member of the Commission for assessing Zagorec’s Master’s thesis, today is training manager of the Heli company.
In part due to the concept the Heli company has put forth, and in part because the author of the theory behind the concept is Vladimir Zagorec, the bidding rivals have for months been opposing their lobbying with numerous logical arguments.
However, if Heli company is to win the bid and receive the concession, some 200-400 million euro could pass through their accounts in the next twenty years. This is the amount that experts have assessed this deal to be worth over that time period. If that happens, the most credit will have to go to Vladimir Zagorec.

In recent years, much has been written about Vladimir Zagorec and the mystery surrounding the majority of deals in RH Alan, the Defense Ministry company that he ran for years, and which obtained arms for the defense of Croatia in the midst of an arms embargo. He has been frequently suspected of various illegalities from that period of time, however, none of that has seriously endangered his freedom and without any problems, he moved to Austria where he formed business ties with several companies and ‘business’ men whom he met which they smuggled arms for the defense of Croatia.
Certain documents and business cards in Nacional’s possession suggest that Constantin Dafermos, the controversial Greek who has been suspected of international arms smuggling, has played a key role in Zagorec’s professional career. Zagorec and Dafermos are both nominally employees of the company Scorpion.
The weekly magazine Globus tried to reveal in late 2002 why Zagorec left RH Alan to work in Austria. Globus reporter revealed that in February of that year, Zagorec registered the company MT LOC Consult in Vienna with 35,000 euro. Zagorec claims that this company, in cooperation with the company Palfinger, patented the project for monitoring logistics via electronic chips and via the GPS system used by the Austrian railways and several other companies.
At that time, Zagorec was living in the luxurious villa in the small ski town St. Marein im Muertztal, 140 km from Vienna. In an interview with Globus, he revealed that the house and the BMW X5 he used both belonged to the company Scorpion.
The Austrian and Russian media have suspected Scorpion of arms smuggling many times. Nacional is in possession of documents and two business cards which suggest that Zagorec’s role in Scorpion came out of prior deals of obtaining arms for Croatia, in which he participated as former head of RH Alan. These are business cards for both Vladimir Zagorec and Constantin Dafermos. These cards show that both men worked for Scorpion, with Zagorec formally employed in the department for import and export, while Dafermos is listed as president of international services. These business cards suggest that both men shared the same room, telephone and fax (0043 1 5233051 and 0043 1 523 3053) in Vienna at the address Schottenfeldgasse 23.
Nacional is also in possession of a file of Italian criminal charges against Constantin Dafermos on 6 April 2001. These charges for arms smuggling towards the countries of the former Yugoslavia are against Constantin Dafermos, Alexander Zukhov, Mark Garber and Leonid Lebedev. These charges came after eight years of intensive investigation, when in 1993 NATO forces stopped a Jadran Express ship carrying 30 thousand machine guns, several tens of thousands rounds of various caliber ammunition and grenades towards the countries of the former Yugoslavia. The Italian prosecutors consider Dafermos to be the brain of the sophisticated operation, which included obtaining phony papers to serve as a cover-up for the arms smuggling, and which suggested that the arms were to end up in certain African countries.
Zagorec commented for Globus in late 2002 on his work in Scorpion, saying “My job is to organize the logistics for fire-fighting. Among other things, Scorpion deals with forest fire fighting in Greece, Cypress, Portugal and Australia, and my responsibilities are logistics, technical support and reserve parts. The planes we work with are civil, not military. My new job is logistics, and not arms trading”.
Over the past few years, Zagorec has begun to invest the money earned from his advisory services in Scorpion, as well as earlier savings, in various construction deals.
To date, it is not widely known that Zagorec represents the interests of a Swiss and Austrian company which are the most serious potential investors in the construction of a new residential-commercial complex near Kaptol Centar in Zagreb, on land the Church has decided to give on a 99 year lease. Sources close to the Church were not overly interested in whether this is Zagorec’s private capital or some foreign capital that Zagorec represents.
The press has already written about other construction projects that Zagorec has been involved in, through other companies under his co-ownership. For example, the company PZ Investment, in which the director is Zagorec’s friend Roman Binder, signed a contract in early 2004 with then Pula mayor Luciano Delbianco on obtaining construction rights in Kandler Street in Pula. The City of Pula handed over 3874 square metres of construction land next to the City Library for the construction of a residential-commercial building, parking garage and electricity station. These works were supposed to have been completed in 18 months, but they have not yet been started as archeologists found valuable classical and medieval finds.
Huber Palfinger, whose company in Austria pays for the consulting services of Vladimir Zagorec, is co-owner of PZ Invest. PZ Invest was founded on 13 June 2003 with money from the company PZ Investment in Austria. The company’s base capital totals 114 thousand kuna, and the gross bookkeeping valur is assessed at about 250 thousand euro.
As of 30 January 2002, Zagorec and Binder are also co-owners of the company Molteh, registered for a wide range of services, with a base capital of 20,000 kunas. The contact address of this address is Hatza Street 1. Both the companies Molteh and PZ Invest are at the same address, as is Hvar Construction, where Zagorec is not mentioned, but Roman Binder is listed as director, and Martinkova Construction, with Roman Binder and Anka Radošović as directors, founded in February 2005.
The informal co-ownership of Zagorec is also assumed in the company Inter-construct, in which Binder is also director as of this year. This is a company which deals with setting up wall and floor coverings for construction and trade. Board members are listed as Ivan Bitanga, Josip Leko and Ivica Pivac.
Other business ties from earlier times, and from other branches of business, came into the spotlight in late 2003 when Zagorec was brutally beaten in a public parking garage in the centre of Zagreb. At that time, Nacional warned who his enemies were from the period when he was at the helm of RH Alan, which could possibly be behind that brutal attack.
Among others, there were suspicions that Zagorec, together with friend Mario Plejic, was co-owner of the company Lovac, which represents numerous well-known weapons manufacturers, which he denied when asked by Nacional. Then he also denied his business ties with Johan Fanzoj, an Austrian rifle manufacturer, his friend and the man thought to be one of the most important ties for obtaining weapons for the defense of Croatia.
Proof that Zagorec wasn’t always truthful in talking about his business deals was seen in the trial against those suspects in the kidnapping of Zagorec’s under-aged son Tomislav, when he did not mention that he was an informal co-owner of the Mango-mambo bar in Zagreb with Ico Mateković, one of the men accused in the kidnapping.
The brutal attack and kidnapping of his son were likely planned against Zagorec because he earned massive wealth in participating in non-transparent arms deals for defending Croatia, and then he invested this money and multiplied it in other business deals.
The business ties between Vladimir Zagorec and Constantin Dafermos in the company Scorpion most directly suggest that Zagorec knew well how to capitalize on each and every business contact, sooner or later. That is why there should be no doubt that, if the Heli company receives the helicopter emergency service concession, that Zagorec will certainly know how to cash in on his new successful business reference, and establish business ties with the company that he now denies having ties with.

Positions held by Zagorec in the 1990s
ACI – supervisory board member, 1995 - 1999
Agency Alan – director, 1993 - 2000
Croatian forests – Management board member, 1996 - 1998
Ikom-kovnica – supervisory board member, 1996 - 1999
Marko Orešković – supervisory board member, 1998 - 1999
Defense Ministry – Deputy Minister, 1993 - 2000
PBZ – supervisory board member, 1995 - 1996
Ribnjačarstvo – supervisory board member, 1997 - 2001
Institute for the organization and implementation of the Second World Military Games, Zagreb 1999 – executive council member, 1998