Ex Belgrade airport head among 56 arrested for corruption

The MUP announced this on Monday.

Those arrested are suspected of committing various corruption crimes from 2008 to date, in particular crimes related to abuse of official position in state bodies.

The suspects were arrested in cooperation with competent prosecutor's offices in the territory of Belgrade, Novi Sad, Pancevo, Smederevo, Zajecar, Kragujevac, Kraljevo, Krusevac, Prokuplje, Pirot and Novi Pazar. The damage to the state and local budgets, and to companies and individuals resulting from the crimes in question exceeds 8.4 million euros, the MUP said.

At the same time, an operation aimed at curbing the gray economy netted 31,627 boxes of cigarettes of different brands that had no excise stamps, worth about 50 million dinars.

Among those arrested are a former responsible person of the airport Nikola Tesla, four police officers, former bankruptcy manager of the company Zastava Kovacnica, as well as employees of the company Railways of Serbia, Postanska Stedionica Bank's branch in Vrsac, Intesa Bank's Pancevo branch, and Jugobanka-JU Bank AD Kosovska Mitrovica, as well as owners and responsible persons in several companies.

40 other suspects have had criminal complaint filed against them in regular procedure.