BELGRADE, May 31 (Hina) - The launch of an Italian investigation against Montenegin President Milo Djukanovic for the alleged smuggling of cigarettes "is the issue of the Italian judiciary", and the Yugoslav government does not want
to get involved, Yugoslav Vice-Premier Miroljub Labus said on Friday.
BELGRADE, May 31 (Hina) - The launch of an Italian investigation
against Montenegin President Milo Djukanovic for the alleged
smuggling of cigarettes "is the issue of the Italian judiciary",
and the Yugoslav government does not want to get involved, Yugoslav
Vice-Premier Miroljub Labus said on Friday. #L#
"I do not see it as a pressure policy, but an issue of the
judiciary," Labus told reporters.
Yugoslav Justice Minister Savo Markovic and Foreign Minister Goran
Svilanovic said that the Yugoslav authorities had received nothing
from the Italian judiciary regarding the investigation against
Djukanovic for "conspiring with the mafia and cigarette
smuggling".
Djukanovic explained the latest writing of the Italian press with
"continued destructions initiated several times by certain Italian
officials and the media."
Belgrade's daily "Glas javnosti" on Friday ran a statement by the
president of the international police organisation for drugs,
Marko Nicovic, who said that this was a "pressure measure by the
European administration to drag Montenegro away from
independence".
"There is probably some compromising material, clues which may harm
Djukanovic politically and in other ways, but this story about the
connection between Montenegro and the Italian mafia in Bari is
several years-old and is this time being used by the European Union
to force Djukanovic to implement the Belgrade Agreement between
Serbia and Montenegro," Nicovic said.
He assessed that the investigation against Djukanovic would cease
as soon as the agreement on the union between Serbia and Montenegro
was definitely adopted.
(hina) lml sb