Herceg Novi

BRUSSELS - BRUSSELS - Novi Sad has been named one of the three European Capitals of Culture for 2021.

Novi Sad and Timisoara, Romania, will in November be joined by a city in Greece - Eleusis, Kalamata or Rhodes.

Novi Sad beat Montenegro's Herceg Novi in the final selection round, becoming the first city from a non-EU country to take the prestigious title.

The Swiss-Egyptian investor in the controversial plans to turn former prison camp into a hotel, has insisted it will preserve the camp's hertage.

Orascom company pledged that the 15 million euro project to convert the Mamula fort into a luxury resort will fully respect the history of the now largely-abandoned site.

A WWII Nazi concentration camp on the island of Mamula where prisoners were tortured and starved will be transformed into a luxury resort which will include a nightclub and spa.

The island is located near Montenegro’s border with Croatia in the Adriatic Sea at the entrance of the Bay of Kotor. Its formal name is Lastavica, but it is widely known as Mamula.

A government report on the implementation of priority projects in the tourism sector, which BIRN has seen, said that the country is looking forward to a huge boost from tourist-related investment.

Fourteen development projects started in 2014 are undergoing expansion and over 250 million euro in investment is expected this year.

A parliamentary committee on Wednesday refused to support government plans to lease out the island of Lastavica and the Mamula fort in Boka Bay, which opposition parties have slated as a corrupt deal.

The proposal to offer the Austro-Hungarian fortress to a private firm to turn into a luxury tourist complex received the support of the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists.

A Montenegrin opposition politician on Wednesday accused the government of treating the nation's cultural heritage as "market goods" after the Austro-Hungarian Mamula fortress on the coast was offered on a lease for a luxury tourist complex.

Montenegro's Council for Privatisation, chaired by Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, on Monday unveiled an ambitious privatisation plan for 2015, aiming to attract more foreign investment.

Bosnia's parliament on Thursday will debate a resolution calling on the government to reject a proposed agreement with Montenegro aimed at determining the border.

The initiative, proposed by parliamentarian Denis Becirovic in November, says it is unacceptable for Bosnia to allow Montenegro to keep a part of the strategically important Bay of Kotor, close to the town of Herceg Novi.

Djukanovic's Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, scored its latest local government poll win on Sunday in Herceg Novi, a town on the Montenegrin-Croatian border.

Although no party won an absolute majority in Sunday's poll, it was clear that the united opposition list had lost its majority for the first time in 14 years.

An audience in Montenegro will a chance to see the country's first domestic film in years on Monday, when "The Boys from the Marx and Engelsa street" ("Dječaci iz ulice Marksa i Englesa") has its first public showing at the Herceg Novi film festival.

Filming has taken nearly four years because of numerous financial problems.