(Podgorica, 22 June 2012) – If the Assembly of Montenegro and the Security Committee were doing their jobs in controlling the executive, our criminals and politicians would not be investigated by the police forces of other states (thereby compromising our state by indicating that it is incapable of coming to terms with organized crime). All MPs who no longer wish to legitimize such a farce should leave our captured parliament.
MANS has been demanding that the Assembly use its powers to force matters to a head with organized crime and corruption in Montenegro ever since the video of Safet Kalic’s wedding was released [Kalic is an important member of Balkan organized crime networks from Montenegro]. On this video one can hear how Naser Keljmendi [recently designated a ‘drug kingpin’ by the Obama administration], was able to cross the Montenegrin border with €500,000 in cash by calling on the then head of the National Security Agency (ANB) Dusko Markovic. Instead of investigating fully these allegations, MANS became the subject of an investigation for having released the video to the public; the opposition in the parliament was treated with a number of empty stories about the background of the case, the alleged conspiracies of foreign intelligence services and alleged framing of the video.
The Security Committee [of the Assembly]held a hearing with Markovic, who was the head of the ANB at the time and who is mentioned in the video, and who seems to have been very much personally involved in the whole affair given the sharp reactions that followed. At the time he told the parliament a story about the alleged operative presence of his colleague Zoran Lazovic at Kalic’s wedding, as well as other constructions that were placed into the public sphere as a means of public disinformation.
In spite of the sharp criticisms voiced by the parliament, MPs shifted their attention to other issues without ever getting an answer as to the exact links between Keljmendi and the leadership of the ANB. Nor did Ranka Carapic [the Supreme State Prosecutor], who submits regular reports to the Assembly, did not offer any answers to MPs as to why she failed to investigate Dusko Markovic’s role in the whole story. Instead, she approved the secret surveillance of MANS for allegedly enabling the video of Kalic’s wedding to see the light of day.
Instead of controlling the intelligence apparatus, MPs have accepted their own degradation since the reports of the ANB and the Police Director are being served to them with a small tea-spoon. The security apparatus thus releases only minimal information that the MPs are only allowed to view under the strict surveillance of those who they are supposed to be monitoring.
These drastic examples confirm that the Assembly of Montenegro has failed to act as a check, but is instead being used as a way of providing cover for the illegal actions of powerful criminals and their ties to the government elite. Through their participation in the half-hearted hearings of individuals with links to the organized crime leadership in the region, opposition MPs are only helping legitimize a farce. For this reason those MPs who do not wish to serve as a cover for such a charade should leave the captured Assembly.
