Church Offer to Guarantee Coup Suspects Divides Montenegro

Podgorica Higher Court is expected to decide this week on a request to release three Serbian citizens accused in the coup case, after the Serbian Orthodox Church offered guarantees for their safety and availability to the court.

The court on Monday did not comment on the offer. However, it confirmed that a request to end detention for the accused, together with guarantees that they will not leave the country while their trial continues, had been filed on Friday.

Dragan Maksic, Srboljub Djordjevic and Milan Dusic are among 14 Russian, Serbian and Montenegrin citizens standing trial for alleged involvement in a plot to overthrow the pro-Western government in October last year.

Reportedly, if the court frees them, they will be placed in one of the Church's monasteries in Montenegro.

It is the first time that the influential Serbian Church, the main faith group in the country, has intervened in such important state and judicial affairs, offering guarantees for suspects, and its move has divided the public.

Some legal experts see nothing controversial in the offer to provide accommodation for the defendants, or in the guarantee that they will remain available to the court in the process.

However, the Liberal Party, a member of the ruling coalition, called the offer a "scandalous" attempt by the Church to interfere in a major trial. "It presents a dangerous clericalization of the state," the party said on Monday.

Eduard Shishmakov and Vladimir Popov, the Russian military intelligence service officers, are accused of being behind a network of Serbian and Montenegrin citizens who planned to assassinate then Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic last October.

Twelve others, including two opposition leaders, are charged with ...