Just a short look at one of Europe's longest running and most twisted stories. Click on title to read the whole thing.
A senior secret service officer accused of organizing last month's assassination of the Serbian prime minister has approached the Hague war crimes tribunal offering information about the two most wanted Bosnian Serb leaders in exchange for a new identity and asylum abroad, according to diplomatic sources speaking to Belgrade media. Police Col. Milorad Lukovic, known as Legija, has had close ties with Radovan Karadzic, former president of Republika Srpska, and his wartime army commander, Gen. Ratko Mladic, reports said Tuesday. He offered to disclose their present whereabouts through an intermediary, they said. As the two most wanted men in the world by the United Nations, prosecutors could not help but find tempting any authoritative information that could lead to their capture.
| So far, the UN's done one helluva job at tracking them down... |
Turning that information into custody is another story, however — as is its price. The new Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Zivkovic today said he was sure the tribunal would not agree to such a bargain. "I can believe Lukovic intends to sell Serbian citizens and others down the river just as he has sold his friends and that he is now about to try and sell something else. But I think he hasn't got the goods he is offering to the Hague tribunal and I am sure the tribunal will not enter into any kind of dirty trading with anybody," he declared.
| First you've got to intend to catch the rabbit. Otherwise, send out for Chinese... |
Lukovic has been on the run since March 12, when reformist Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic was shot and killed while he walked from his car into the government building in Belgrade. Serbian authorities believe Lukovic and his alleged connections to organized crime were behind the assassination. Two men accused with Lukovic of planning the assassination were traced by police to a rural farmhouse outside Belgrade and killed in a shootout last Thursday. They were Dusan Spasojevic, also a former secret service officer, and Mile Lukovic. All three were leaders of Serbia's most powerful criminal gang, known as "Zemun Clan." Police said Tuesday Lukovic may have fled the country on a Croatian passport. The Serbian police ministry said Lukovic possesses a diplomatic passport issued in 1996 in which his profession was given as "an expert."
And we know what he is expert in, don't we? |