Post by Bozur on Oct 28, 2008 23:31:12 GMT -5
Montenegro Quiet on Croatia Car Bombing
28 October 2008 Podgorica _ Montenegro’s government says it has no reason to comment on last week’s murder of Croatian journalist Ivo Pukanic, who in 2001 had linked the Prime Minister to cigarette smuggling.
“There is no reason for a comment from the Montenegrin cabinet,” the office for Montenegro Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic said.
In 2001, Pukanic’s Nacional weekly published a series of articles linking Djukanovic to the 1990s Balkan tobacco mafia.
The articles were republished in Podgorica daily Dan, whose editor-in-chief Dusko Jovanovic was killed in May 2004.
When approached by journalists from Croatia’s javno.hr news portal, Montenegro’s cabinet said they had nothing to say on the matter and wished the journalist ‘a nice day.’
Following last Thursday’s car bombing in central Zagreb which killed Pukanic and his marketing chief, Niko Franjic, Duda Rabrenovic, the spokesperson for Montenegro’s President expressed regret and shock over the tragedy.
Croatian police have since issued a sketch of a suspect they are looking for in connection to the bombing. Read more: www.balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/14303/
Earlier this month, the Anti-Mafia Department in Italy’s southern town of Bari requested charges to be filed against seven Serbian and Montenegrin nationals suspected of involvement in smuggling of cigarettes between Montenegro and the Italian province of Puglia during the 1994-2002 period.
Montenegro’s Premier however was not on the list.
Earlier this year, Djukanovic regained the premiership in the small Adriatic state of Montenegro for the fifth time since 1991 when he was one of the closest of former Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic’s allies in the former Yugoslavia. He also served a term as the country’s president.
Djukanovic is being investigated for alleged gains that he made from the lucrative illegal trade of cigarettes from that period.
He denies those claims.
In March, he told Italian prosecutors it was necessary for Montenegrin ministers at the time to open Swiss bank accounts, so they could purchase medicines and other goods necessary for the survival of the nation, "caught between [international] sanctions and the Milosevic regime."
Read more: balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/9025
www.balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/14380/