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Belgrade, 24 May (AKI) - The conviction of 12 people for the murder of prime minister Zoran Djindic in March 2003, was seen by Serbian politicians across the political spectrum on Thursday as a victory of justice and a proof of the judiciary's independence. After a three and a half year trial, a special court in Belgrade Wednesday sentenced 12 former members of a special police unit 'Red berets' and members of the so called Zemun criminal gang, headed by Milorad Ulemek Legija and Zvezdan Jovanovic, to maximum sentences of between 35 and 40 years in jail each for a...

Kostunica's New Secret Service Chief Was Suspect in Djindjic Assassination Mar 6, 2004 The Associated Press BELGRADE, Serbia-Montenegro (AP) - Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica on Saturday appointed a close aide as his new secret service chief, despite his arrest as a suspect in the assassination of a chief of government. Rade Bulatovic was a security adviser while Kostunica was president of Yugoslavia, the predecessor state to Serbia-Montenegro. He also was among dozens of suspects that the police said were part of the plot to kill former Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic. He was arrested March 12 and held for several weeks,...

BELGRADE, Serbia-Montenegro - The alleged assassin of Serb Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic told police days after the slaying that he killed the reformist leader to stop the extradition of Serbs to the U.N. war crimes tribunal, according to a confession read out Thursday at his trial. Zvezdan Jovanovic, a former commander of an elite police unit, is charged with firing the fatal shots that killed Djindjic on March 12 as he stepped out of his car in front of the government headquarters in central Belgrade. "I personally killed Zoran Djindjic," Jovanovic reportedly said during an interrogation after his arrest in...

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Two men wanted in connection with the assassination of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic have been arrested in Rotterdam, the Dutch public prosecutor's spokesman says. Ninoslav Konstantinovic and his brother, Sladjan Konstantinovic, were arrested on Saturday afternoon, an official said. "The national police investigation branch arrested at the start of the afternoon two suspects of the murder of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic," the public prosecutor's office said in a statement. "The brothers arrested on Saturday have probably been staying in the Netherlands for several months...Both suspects have been arrested by a special team in Rotterdam." "The...

BELGRADE, Oct 20 (AFP) - A bodyguard of slain Serbian prime minister Zoran Djindjic Monday disputed the findings of an official enquiry, insisting that two crack marksmen had carried out the assassination instead of one. He told a radio station he believed two snipers facing each other from two streets parallel to the government headquarters had opened fire on the victim. But the interior ministry and state prosecutor dismissed his claims as an emotional reaction and speculation. Milan Veruovic, head of Djindjic's personal security detail, was himself seriously wounded in the shooting in the courtyard of the government building last...

BENIDORM, Spain (Reuters) - Police may have missed a chance to thwart the assassination of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic due to poor cooperation in tracking stolen blank passports, according to the head of Interpol. Secretary General Ronald Noble said police now knew that Milorad Ulemek, a key suspect in the March 12 shooting in Belgrade, had obtained one of 100 blank Croatian passports stolen from that country's consulate in Mostar, Bosnia, in 1999. Ulemek, a former paramilitary and gang leader also known as Milorad Lukovic or by the nickname "Legija," used the passport to travel extensively through Switzerland, Austria,...

Serbian police have arrested a senior special police officer on suspicion of assassinating Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic. Mr Djindjic's successor as prime minister, Zoran Zivkovic, said the man was a deputy commander of the Unit for Special Operations (JSO), Zvezdan Jovanovic, aged 38. "Police have identified the person who, there are good grounds to suspect, fired at late Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic," he told a news conference. "He was arrested yesterday and has been detained for further investigation." Mr Djindjic was killed by a sniper's bullet outside government buildings in Belgrade on 12 March. Just hours after the killing,...

BELGRADE, Serbia-Montenegro (AP) The suspected sniper who killed Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic two weeks ago has been arrested, the slain premier's successor said Tuesday. Prime Minister Zoran Zivkovic identified the suspect in custody as Zvezdan Jovanovic, a former deputy commander of an elite unit of police troops under former President Slobodan Milosevic. Zivkovic said police found a German-made sniper rifle suspected of being the murder weapon. Another man, identified as Sasa Pejakovic, was arrested for allegedly aiding the sniper during the killing, he said. Djindjic, Serbia's leading pro-Western politician, was killed by a sniper March 12 as he...

A file photo from June 27, 2002 shows Svetlana 'Ceca' Roznjatovic, one of the most popular singers in Serbia, talking to journalists in Banja Luka. Serbian police hunting for the killers of Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic on Monday raided the Belgrade home of feared warlord Arkan's young widow. B92 radio, quoting sources close to the investigation, said police had detained Raznatovic 'because of her close links' to a prime suspect, alleged Serbian gangster boss Milorad Lukovic, or Legija. REUTERS/Ranko Cukovic

Comment -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The quisling of Belgrade The murdered Serbian prime minister was a reviled western stooge whose economic reforms brought misery Neil Clark Friday March 14, 2003 The Guardian Tributes to Zoran Djindjic, the assassinated prime minister of Serbia, have been pouring in. President Bush led the way, praising his "strong leadership", while the Canadian government's spokesman extolled a "heralder of democracy" and Tony Blair spoke of the energy Djindjic had devoted to "reforming Serbia". In western newspaper obituaries Djindjic has been almost universally acclaimed as an ex-student agititator who bravely led a popular uprising against a tyrannical dictator and...

The assassination of Serbia's prime minister, Zoran Djindjic, by a sharpshooter in broad daylight in front of a government building on Wednesday, signals that all is not well within the borders of the metropolitan power of the Balkans. The chief tactician of Serbia's Prudent Revolution that overthrew Milosevic in October 2000, Djindjic was a controversial figure who courted the West with mixed success, achieved limited but substantial economic and legal reform largely by surrounding himself with honest and skilled technocrats, faced much internal obfuscation, and made many enemies along the way. The heir to the throne of Serbia expressed succinctly...

FOR the first time in months, the Monument Café had put tables outdoors in the sun for the gathering lunch crowd. Waiters doled out menus and mineral water. No one noticed when, at 12.35pm, the barrel of a high-powered rifle peeked out from the second-floor window of a dingy, half-empty building next door. Less than 200 metres away, across an empty park, Zoran Djindjic, the Serbian Prime Minister, and his security men left a side door of the government headquarters on Nemanjina Boulevard. One of the café’s waiters heard two or three soft cracks, but hardly anyone else noticed. The...

In memorial Zoran Djindjic (1952-2003) Belgrade, March 12, 2003 - Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic was shot at 12.25 local time in front of the Serbian Government Building. He died at 13.30 in the Emergency Ward of the Serbian Clinic Centre in Belgrade. Sign the condolence register at www.serbia-today.com Inapropiate remarks will be removed!

This translations comes from this page:The furore over Yugoslavia's involvement in arms deals with Iraq is being blamed on federal president Vojislav Kostunica's unwillingness to get rid of key figures from the Milosevic regime. The authorities have now started a clean-up operation to rid themselves of Milosevic-era officials suspected of masterminding an operation to supply military services and equipment to Baghdad, following strong pressure from the United States. General director of the main state arms trade company Jugoimport, Jovan Cekovic, and defence ministry arms trade assistant, General Ivan Djokic, were both dismissed from their posts on October 22. The move...

    | |     February 6, 2002Yugoslavia's EndThe name is gone, but delusions remain This Tuesday, the parliament of the last Yugoslavia decided to lay the name and the idea to rest, abolishing the country in favor of a new, ill-defined entity called "Serbia and Montenegro." The new Constitutional Charter and the bill governing its implementation had already been passed by the Serbian parliament on the 28th, and by the parliament of Montenegro the day after. The decision is not unexpected. As early as last March, Serbia and Montenegro's vassal potentates signed a pledge drafted by their...

Wednesday, 22 January, 2003, 00:29 GMT US threatens to cut aid to Belgrade Prosper (left) urged Serbs to cooperate By Matthew Price BBC correspondent in Belgrade The authorities in Belgrade have been told that they must hand over three key war crimes suspects by 31 March or risk losing financial aid and other support from the United States. Mladic's arrest could mean an end to further prosecutions The message was delivered to Belgrade during a visit by the US Department of State's Ambassador for War Crimes Issues, Pierre-Richard Prosper. Mr Prosper suggested if the three individuals are handed over there...

By ALEKSANDAR VASOVIC .c The Associated Press  BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (AP) - Serbia's ruling coalition moved to oust all 45 members of Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica's party from parliament Monday, the latest threat to Yugoslavia's political stability. On Friday, the coalition removed Kostunica's Democratic Party of Serbia from its ranks, saying it didn't support the Serbian government and tarnished the coalition's reputation. The latest move was certain to worsen the feud between Kostunica and rival Zoran Djindjic, the prime minister of Serbia, Yugoslavia's main republic. The other is Montenegro. Kostunica and Djindjic united in 2000 to oust former Yugoslav President Slobodan...

Thus Spoke Djindjich (re. Serbia, attn. Balkan Front Freepers!)It would do us no harm to remind ourselves what certain politicians were saying when they were not in power. It would also be interesting to compare their earlier statements with their behaviour of today.  For this purpose, here are some of Prime Minister Djindjich's statements from his days as an opposition leader.  I will never go to Dedinye (synonym for ex-President Miloshevich's residence), nor will I fire people for different ideological views. (Blic, 2-3 NOV 1996) We ask that the government be changed at the ballot box, not by fraud. ...

Serb Arrest Points to Coup Against Djindjic16 March 2002 Summary Profiles:MOMCILO PERISIC - Deputy Prime Minister of Republic of SerbiaNEBOJSA PAVKOVIC - Yugoslav Army Chief of Staff Yugoslav military security service personnel arrested Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Momcilo Perisic March 14 on charges of espionage. The move was likely part of an effort by Serb nationalists to depose pro-Western Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic. Djindjic will probably be able to foil the plot, if he can survive the weekend. Analysis On the evening of March 14, Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Momcilo Perisic was having dinner with John Neighbor, an official...