Montenegro Ex-Chief Prosecutor, Ex-Police Boss, Face Organised Crime Charges

Prosecutor's Office accuses former top police official Zoran Lazovic of creating a criminal organisation that former Chief Special Prosecutor Milivoje Katnic joined.

Former chief special prosecutor Milivoje Katnic was for more than ten hours. Photo: Boris Pejovic

Former Montenegrin Chief Special Prosecutor Milivoj Katnic and former Assistant Director of the Police Zoran Lazovic were arrested on Sunday by order of the Special Prosecutor’s Office and detained for up to 72 hours.

Lazovic is suspected of creating a criminal organisation, his lawyers said on Sunday, while Katnic is suspected of becoming a member of that organisation. Both are charged with abuse of official position.

Media reports said the Special Prosecutor’s Office suspects Lazovic was responsible for lifting the ban on entry into Montenegro in 2020 of two Serbian members of the notorious Kavac crime clan, Veljko Belivuk and Marko Miljkovic, and that Katnic allegedly helped him.

Lazovic’s lawyer, Stefan Jovanovic, did not confirm or deny the allegations. “Everything that has been written in the media so far has now resulted in an investigation. It is about something that has been known to the public for a long time, and about something for which there is no evidence,” he told BIRN.

Lazovic has denied guilt but did not want to answer the prosecutors’ questions, he added. “It’s about things that have been relevant in the media and politically for a long time. In his defence, he explained in detail everything he was suspected of but he refused to answer [other] questions because of the situation he was put in,” Jovanovic said.

Belivuk and Miljkovic are currently on trial in Serbia for several killings they boasted about to members of their criminal group via the Sky application.

In Montenegro, they are suspected of kidnapping Mileta Radulovic, a member of the rival Skaljari clan, on October 14, 2020, who they then handed over to other members of the Kavac group. Radulovic was killed after two months of torture.

Former deputy police director Zoran Lazovic, Photo: Boris PejovicžB

The Special State Prosecutor’s Office on Sunday said investigation against Lazovic and Katnic had gone on for several months in cooperation with the European Union police body EUROPOL.

Interior Minister Danilo Saranovic said on Sunday that, after the arrests, searches were carried out at eight locations used by Lazovic and Katnic in Bijelo Polje, Danilovgrad and Podgorica.

“Activities in the case, codenamed Alpha, will continue… In relation to Katnic and Lazovic, in parallel with this procedure, a financial investigation will be conducted, which will probably [mean…] the investigation itself will be extended to other related persons as well,” Saranovic told TV Vijesti.

The arrests were widely welcomed. Prime Minister Milojko Spajic said he supported the continuous fight of the Special Prosecutor’s Office against all types of crime and corruption. President Jakov Milatovic said the activities of the Prosecutor’s Office were of key importance to improving the rule of law in Montenegro.

The action was also welcomed by former Prime Minister Dritan Abazovic who, while in office had accused Katnic and Lazovic of being “at the top of the criminal pyramid in Montenegro”.

However, the former ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, said the arrests were acts of political revenge aimed at criminalizing the previous government it had led.

Supreme State Prosecutor Milorad Markovic said the establishment of the rule of law is the task of all institutions and everyone should work together, each within their competences.

Katnic was Chief Special Prosecutor from 2015 to 2022, when he was dismissed. Katnic contested this decision but his appeal was rejected by the Administrative Court.

In his first year as head of the Special Prosecutor’s Office, he won praise after he issued an arrest warrant for the former high-ranking DPS official Svetozar Marovic, who later admitted he was the head of a criminal group that deprived the state of tens of millions of euros.

After signing two plea agreements, Marovic used his release from custody to flee to Belgrade, where he now lives freely because the Serbian authorities have refused to extradite him to Montenegro.

More controversially, Katnic was the main prosecutor in the case of an alleged “coup” against the DPS government in 2016.

The indictment he issued for this included Russian and Serbian citizens and two leaders in Montenegro of the former Democratic Front – the current president of parliament of Montenegro Andrija Mandic and MP Milan Knezevic, president of the Democratic People’s Party, a member of the current ruling coalition.

The first-instance verdict sentenced all of them to several years in prison but the Court of Appeal subsequently returned the process to the beginning.

Katnic was accused of working in favour of the DPS and of protecting the former DPS leader, the former long-serving prime minister and president of Montenegro, Milo Djukanovic.

Lazovic, until March 2021, when he was dismissed, headed the Police’s sector for the fight against organised crime. Although he spent his working life in the police and the National Security Agency, some opposition and NGOs claimed he was connected to criminal clans.

His son, Petar, a former National Security Agency official, has been in custody for almost two years, awaiting trial. He was arrested in July 2022 after being identified as a member of the Kavac clan, which is linked to international cocaine smuggling.

Several leaders of judicial institutions and the police have been arrested in the last two years by order of the prosecutor’s office.

Indictments and trials are being conducted against the former president of the Supreme Court, Vesna Medenica, former police directors Veselin Veljovic and Slavko Stojanovic, deputy police director Dejan Knezevic, as well as Katnic’s assistant in the Special Prosecutor’s Office, Sasa Cadjenovic.