In a significant move against organized crime and corruption, Montenegro's Special Prosecutor's Office ordered the arrest of Milivoje Katnić, former chief prosecutor, and Zoran Lazović, a former high-ranking police official, on Sunday, as announced by the Prosecutor's spokesperson.
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| Milivoje Katnić accompanied by Montenegrin special forces |
"Katnić and Lazović have been deprived of their liberty on suspicion of committing criminal offenses of forming a criminal organization and abusing official duty," stated the spokesperson for the Special Prosecutor's Office, Vukash Radonjić, local media report.
Radonjić emphasized that the arrest of the former chief prosecutor and assistant police director was based on the collaboration between the prosecutor's office and EUROPOL, the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation.
"There is ongoing inspection of their residences and properties in Podgorica, Cetinje, Budva, and Bijelo Polje to find evidence of criminal activity and items that may be useful for the proceedings," Radonjić added.
He further stated that Katnić and Lazović would be brought before the Special Prosecutor's Office for questioning within the legal timeframe.
Montenegrin Prime Minister Milojko Spajić welcomed the continued efforts of the Special Prosecutor's Office against all forms of organized crime and corruption. These actions demonstrate the extent of organized crime infiltration into the institutional system, established during the former administrations, said Prime Minister Spajić.
"It is therefore crucial that the current government, through the creation of legal and practical conditions, makes a clear break from past practices and fundamentally transforms our country into a European one, free from the scourge of crime and corruption that has plagued us for decades," wrote the Montenegrin Prime Minister on the X platform.
Milivoje Katnić served as the special prosecutor since 2015, having come to the position from the appellate court judge position. He was dismissed in early 2022, a year and a half after the change of government in Montenegro, when the Democratic Party of Socialists of former Montenegrin President Milo Đukanović went into opposition after thirty years in power.
The new authorities accused Katnić of persecuting the opposition and protecting the highest officials of the DPS, including former President Đukanović.
He was the lead prosecutor in the case of the 2016 attempted terrorism and "coup" plot, the indictment of which included Russian and Serbian nationals, as well as leaders of the pro-Russian Democratic Front - the current President of the Montenegrin Parliament, Andrija Mandić, and the deputy Milan Knežević, chairman of the Democratic People's Party, a member of the governing coalition.
The first-instance decision sentenced them all to several years in prison, but later the Appeals Court overturned the trial.
Former Deputy Police Director Zoran Lazović has been a longtime police official responsible for combating organized crime.
In the past two years, the Montenegrin Prosecution has carried out several arrests of former heads of justice and police institutions.
Charges and trials are underway against former Supreme Court President Vesna Medenica, former police directors Veselin Velović and Slavko Stojanović, police deputy director Dejan Knežević, Katnić's assistants in the Special Prosecutor's Office, Saša Čađenović, and others.