Montenegro Govt Ignored Warnings About Police Ties to Drug Gangs

EUROPOL headquarters in the Hague, Netherlands. Photo: EPA-EFE/JERRY LAMPEN

Milovic said this startling info was presented to the former government at an official meeting but did not name the three officers or their ranks.

"Less than two months ago, partner services from abroad at a meeting with the government pointed out that they had identified three police officers whose accounts have over 50 million [euros in them, each]," Milovic told the newspaper Vijesti.

Citing the European police agency EUROPOL report to the Montenegrin government, news portal Libertas Press on May 3 named two senior police officers, Petar Lazovic and Ljubo Milovic, who were allegedly tied to the notorious Kavac gang, a group of drug smugglers from the town of Kotor, providing them official protection for their drug, arms and tobacco smuggling.

Lazovic is also a National Security Agency officer and son of former senior police officer Zoran Lazovic, who was dismissed last March after the authorities accused him of having ties to criminal groups.

According to the EUROPOL report, Lazovic and Milovic were in direct communication with one of the Kavac gang leaders, Radoje Zvicer, and with Veljko Belivuk, alleged leader of a violent Serbian crime gang, who was arrested in February 2021.

"Lazovic and Milovic provided protection to the Kavac clan and informed them about sensitive operational data from the police … The assumption is that Milovic has an unknown bank account with 48 million euros in it, earned from cocaine smuggling," Libertas Press cited the EUROPOL report as saying.

On Wednesday, the Police Directorate said it had not been informed about the EUROPOL report, while Special State Prosecutor, Vladimir Novovic, relaunched an aborted...