Dacic Not Considering Resignation over Arrest of Belgrade Police Chief

Ivica Dacic (BETAPHOTO/MUP SRBIJE)

Serbian Minister of the Interior Ivica Dacic said on May 25 that he doesn’t think he should resign because of a shooting at a restaurant in Belgrade’s Senjak neighbourhood, after which several people were arrested, including the Belgrade police chief, Veselin Milic, and three other police officers.

“In this case, no one can raise the issue of political responsibility, and I have already said that,” Dacic said in an interview for Danas.rs. The minister also said he did not plan to propose the dismissal of police director Dragan Vasiljevic either, arguing that “it was not Vasiljevic who  appointed Veselin Milic, and there’s no reason to call him to account either.” When reminded that Milic was an assistant to the police chief, too, Dacic said he still didn’t see a reason for Vasiljevic’s accountability.

When asked why a senior member of his Socialist Party of Serbia, Branko Ruzic, resigned as education minister after the tragic shooting at the “Vladislav Ribnikar” elementary school, even though no direct responsibility existed either, Dacic said he disagreed with that decision, and that “Ruzic should not have resigned over Ribnikar”.

“Why would I offer my resignation because of this? I bear no responsibility whatsoever in this regard, nor did I participate in those criminal acts,” Dacic had said in a previous interview with  Prva TV, explaining that it was not him at the helm of the police department, but the police chief. “Veselin Milic is from a former police director, Veljovic’s circle, and Veljovic was the Democratic Party’s apointee,” Dacic said.