Zoran Djindjic

BELGRADE - Serbian PM Ana Brnabic and members of her cabinet on Tuesday laid wreaths on the site where former Serbian PM Zoran Djindjic was assassinated 21 years ago.

The laying of wreaths was attended by other ministers and members of the Government of Serbia.

The second was Zoran Vukojevic, a former policeman who was working as a security guard at gang leader Spasojevic's house.

The third was Branislav Bezarevic, who worked for the Security Information Agency, BIA, Serbia's national intelligence agency, and was Vukojevic's friend from police school.

"The commander ordered that the Communication Centre will no longer receive calls," said a note entered at 5.10pm on November 9, 2001 in the daily log of the Communication Centre in Kula, the headquarters of Serbia's State Security Special Operations Unit, the JSO.

Belgrade Higher Court told BIRN that Zvezdan Jovanovic, who shot dead Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic in 2003, is not eligible to ask for conditional release from prison until the end of 2029, despite a campaign calling for him to be freed immediately as a 'Serbian hero'.

"Milosevic's men on the ground" was the most common description of these two leading Serbian state security officials - Jovica Stanisic, chief of the interior ministry's State Security Service and his right-hand man, Franko 'Frenki' Simatovic, commander of the service's Special Operations Unit.

On April 5 this year at Belgrade Higher Court, the trial will start for an attempted murder in a village near Zagreb in Croatia in June 2010.

Both the suspect and the victim, Milos Simovic and Sretko Kalinic, are Serbian citizens and former members of a notorious criminal gang.

Looking back almost 20 years later, veteran journalist Milos Vasic told BIRN in an interview that the incident should have been recognised at the time as the "next step" in a chain of events that ultimately led to the assassination of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic on March 12, 2003.

He has also said that he favours early release from prison for Milorad 'Legija' Ulemek and Zvezdan Jovanovic, who are serving sentences for the assassination of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic in 2003. He said that they should be freed because "they are heroes" who fought on behalf of Serbs.

In a final ruling that was made public on Monday, Belgrade Appeals Court cleared Milorad 'Legija' Ulemek and six other former members of the Special Operations Unit, JSO of involvement in a rebellion in November 2001 against the Serbian government led by Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic.