When the killer is the state, it is difficult to expect that it will accuse itself, said historian Branka Prpa last night, commenting decision of the Court of Appeal to acquit those accused of the murder of Slavko Ćuruvija for Insider television. She was with Ćuruvija when, on Easter, April 11, 1999, she was at the entrance of the building where he lived in Svetogorska Street in Belgrade killed with 17 shots from behind.
Without the public there is no freedom, she continued, and as much as they expect this to be their victory, "this is their great defeat."
"That system, which we could see with the murder of Zoran Djindjic, has not been dismantled." "The fact that it happened on October 5, that one team came down from power, did not mean a fundamental change, because the system that supported the people and ideas that we wanted to change remained," said Prpa.
And that the system has not been changed is best shown by the fact that the man who is now the president of the country was the minister of information at the time when Ćuruvija was killed.
"It turns out that the state security service has a hobby, which is to kill people in their spare time, outside of their usual jobs." It's a somnabulia we live in and it's rude. Not to create a context, a circumstance for a single moment, and to say what is most normal in court processes and investigations of a serious criminal offense such as premeditated murder - who is behind it," said Prpa earlier in interview for "Time".
At that time, she said that "we have a president who, in his previous position as prime minister, initiated the initiation of the court process, but at no single moment in the investigation that has been going on for a full 20 years has he been invited to an informative interview because, as the minister of information at the time of the crime, he must have had some knowledge , direct or indirect who ordered that murder".
Vučić: Terrible message
And Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić said that the acquittal in the case of the murder of journalist Slavko Ćuruvija is a "terrible message for the justice system."
"I think it's a great injustice and a terribly bad thing for our country, and a terribly bad message for everyone who is engaged in that business in our country, a terribly bad message for our legal system," Vučić said on February 5 on Happy TV.
Where and how to proceed
"Now the question is where to go next and what can be done to investigate what kind of court team this is and what was its function after all", said Prpa and emphasized that the court proceedings were "shameful" and that this kind of country "enemy of its citizens".
"Obviously, we have very serious problems as a country, especially in the definition of something called the rule of law. We have a problem with something that is political ethics, because a state that kills its citizens really has to make an absolute change in its structure, in order to become a state that protects the lives of its citizens," Prpa said.
About a hundred representatives of journalist associations, media associations and trade unions held a meeting on Monday protest in front of the Appellate Court in Belgrade due to the acquittal of the accused for the murder of Slavko Ćuruvija.
