In his last interview with BIRN in October, Oliver Ivanovic, the Kosovo Serb politician murdered in January, named Milan Radoicic as the key figure and a real power-holder in the Serb-run north of Kosovo.
He asked BIRN to keep that part of the interview off the record, fearing possible retaliation.
In the one-to-one interview, recorded audio and in notes, Ivanovic maintained that power in northern Kosovo did not lie with elected institutions but with “informal centres of power” – and named Radoicic in connection with this informal system of power.
“The centre of power is not within the municipality building – because the municipality building belongs to this other, informal centre of power,” Ivanovic said.
He then added: “The [Serbian] president [Aleksandar Vucic] mentioned Milan Radoicic, which honestly speaking worries me; it worries me horribly that he takes him as an example of a person who is fighting for the protection of Serbs in Kosovo.”
Ivanovic was referring to Vucic’s words of praise at a press conference held in September when he named Radoicic as one of five men who he thanked for “safeguarding Serbia in Kosovo”.
Despite asking BIRN to keep his words about informal centres of power off the record, Ivanovic told the BIRN journalist to remember Radoicic’s name.
“No, no, no, leave it there, remember that, you’ll have that name there,” Ivanovic said when the journalist started to cross out Radoicic’s name from the notes.
Radoicic, who has been in the spotlight in recent months, has close links with political elites in both Kosovo and Serbia, including Vucic and Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj.
He has faced legal charges in Serbia several times, and is a close associate of the controversial Kosovo Serb businessmen Zvonko Veselinovic.
Radoicic refused to talk to BIRN for this article.
Ivanovic was shot dead in Mitrovica on January 16 outside the offices of his Freedom, Democracy, Justice party, which was in opposition to the Belgrade-backed Kosovo Serb party Srpska Lista.
For more read the full of article at The Balkaninsight
