SERBIAN drug lord Dragoslav Kosmajac will no longer be able to use his Slovak passport when travelling.
The Interior Ministry has suspended his passport, which he received after he became a Slovak citizen in 2004, Minister Robert Kaliňák said, as reported by the TASR newswire.
Kosmajac was reported to have left Serbia using a Slovak passport on June 20. The Interior Ministry confirmed on June 23 that Kosmajac is yet another prominent drug dealer from the Balkans with Slovak citizenship, which he received on September 13, 2004, under the second government of Mikuláš Dzurinda (2002-2006), the Sme daily reported.
Last Friday, June 20, Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic labelled Kosmajac Serbia’s biggest drug dealer and suggested he has links with the police, which could explain why there is currently no warrant issued for his arrest, Sme wrote. Kosmajac left Serbia only hours after Vucic mentioned him at a June 20 press conference, using his Slovak passport to cross the seldom used Jabuka checkpoint into Montenegro as a free man, Sme reported, citing the local Blic newspaper.
The Slovak authorities looked into Kosmajac’s file and found “signs of certain insufficiencies and even manipulation”, Kaliňák said, as quoted by TASR. Finally, the ministry proclaimed that his citizenship had never been established.
“We have made an immediate decision about the fact that all the information we have for now constitutes a reasonable belief that the citizenship was not established,” the minister said, as quoted by TASR, adding that now all the national and European systems have been alerted that Kosmajac’s Slovak documents are no longer valid, and if he attempts to cross borders using his Slovak passport, he will be detained.
Kaliňák revealed there was another similar case to Kosmajac, for which the ministry took the same measures, but he did not provide any details.
The minister also announced that he ordered an overall audit that should examine the granting of Slovak citizenship in the years when Slovak legislation was more lenient, before 2006.
Source: TASR
Compiled by Michaela Terenzani from press reports.
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information
presented in its Flash News postings.
