Follow-Up: Serbia's Post-Election Reckoning: Flight Carrying Ex-Intelligence Chief to Moscow Ordered Back, Bank Owner Arrested
Belgrade, Serbia — A week after the Student List won Serbia's October 25 parliamentary election and ended the ruling party's 14-year hold on power, a post-election reckoning is moving fast: former government and police officials have been detained, a bank linked to former president Aleksandar Vucic's family has collapsed and its owner arrested, and on the evening of November 3 an Air Serbia flight to Moscow carrying three Vucic allies was ordered to turn back mid-flight.
Flight JU134 left Belgrade at 6:48 p.m. and reversed course over southern Lithuania, landing shortly before 10 p.m., N1 reported. On board were Aleksandar Vulin, the former head of the Security Intelligence Agency (BIA), and Dusan Bajatovic, head of state gas company Srbijagas; Bajatovic confirmed that minister Nenad Popovic was also on the flight. According to Nova.rs, citing unofficial information, the turnback was ordered by Milan Kuc, corporate security director at Belgrade airport, after camera footage suggested Vulin had boarded without passing the usual security procedures.
Vulin told TV Informer that he subsequently passed all checks and that nothing illegal was found. The airport, police and prosecutors had made no statement by early November 4, and a report by Vreme that a prosecutor was waiting for Vulin at the airport remains unconfirmed. Vulin has been under US sanctions since July 2023, when the Treasury Department accused him of involvement in transnational organised crime and misuse of public office.
Serbian media report that since the election, authorities have detained a number of former state and police officials on accusations of corruption and of using violence against protesters, and that the leadership of state media has been replaced wholesale. Alta banka, a bank informally associated with Vucic's family that processed payments for many state companies, including utilities and Air Serbia itself, has gone bankrupt; prosecutors have arrested its owner, Davor Macura, on suspicion of taking 45 billion dinars (about €383 million) from the bank's vault.
Vucic resigned as president in September to run for prime minister, but his Serbian Progressive Party alliance lost the October 25 snap election to the Student List, a movement born of nearly two years of anti-corruption protests; GSM previously reported the Student List at about 52.7 percent of the vote and roughly 139 seats. The winning side has asked banks to watch for capital flight during the handover, and the new parliament is expected to convene in December.
Source: bne IntelliNews
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：塞尔维亚航空一架空客A319客机（资料图）。摄影：Aeroprints.com，CC BY-SA 3.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: An Air Serbia Airbus A319 (file photo). By Aeroprints.com, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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