B92’s Matić on work of commission on murder of journalists

BELGRADE Only two months after the commission on murder of journalists started working, you can already sense nervousness among potential perpetrators, Veran Matic says. Matic, B92 editor-in-chief and the commission head, told daily Danas that there was a tendency of influencing investigators, commission members and others involved in the investigation. B92’s Matic on work of commission on murder of journalists “Of course, there is also the spreading of disinformation and half-information that should hinder the commission’s work and create false leads. We have been expecting all that,” he told the daily. “I cannot talk about the commission’s current activities because we have an analysis and an investigation regarding a new leader, some old information or a tipoff every day. Around 20 MUP (Serbian police) operatives, with the help of the BIA (Security-Information Agency) commission members, work every day,” he explained. Yesterday, the commission on murder of journalists received documents from the Prosecution regarding the case of murdered journalist Dada Vujasinovic, Matic confirmed. He added that the commission now had all files and that they would be sent to some of the specialized institutions. “At a commission session held last week we agreed that it was necessary to find and hire a credible institution or individuals, specialists in ballistics and forensic medicine with great experience that includes processing at least 50 murders a year, that we would hire in order to solve the murder of journalist Dada Vujasinovic,” he was quoted as saying. He added that the commission members had agreed to send a proposal to the Prosecution and propose coordination so findings of those experts and institutions would be a part of the investigation and relevant for the court proceeding. “The decision and proposal of the commission were forwarded to the Prosecution on Friday. At the same time, we requested a meeting in order to agree on practical aspects of cooperation on these issues which includes an agreement on how to present the entire documentation regarding the super-expertise that will give credible results that could be defined as indisputable,” the commission on murder of journalists head stressed. According to him, forensic and ballistics expertise in the Vujasinovic case performed at the crime scene and afterward is contradictory and caused doubts and insecurities as to how the journalist died and as a result “upset the family, colleagues and the public”. “The commission has sent a request to the Prosecution to provide copies of documents in the murder cases of Dada Vujasinovic, Slavko Curuvija and Milan Pantic. We expect the documents to be submitted to the commission very soon so it could successfully continue its work which is primarily aimed at determining the truth about these murders, which means direct help to prosecutors working on these cases. It is very important to get these documents as soon as possible because the commission is intensively working on the analysis of the existing documents but it also encourages the work of investigative teams that are working on all three cases and who miss parts of documents that the prosecutors obtained outside the police investigation,” Matic stressed and added that the Prosecution was also preparing copies of files in the Curuvija and Pantic murder cases. Veran Matic (file) Danas

B92’s Matić on work of commission on murder of journalists

“Of course, there is also the spreading of disinformation and half-information that should hinder the commission’s work and create false leads. We have been expecting all that,” he told the daily.

“I cannot talk about the commission’s current activities because we have an analysis and an investigation regarding a new leader, some old information or a tipoff every day. Around 20 MUP (Serbian police) operatives, with the help of the BIA (Security-Information Agency) commission members, work every day,” he explained.

Yesterday, the commission on murder of journalists received documents from the Prosecution regarding the case of murdered journalist Dada Vujasinović, Matić confirmed. He added that the commission now had all files and that they would be sent to some of the specialized institutions.

“At a commission session held last week we agreed that it was necessary to find and hire a credible institution or individuals, specialists in ballistics and forensic medicine with great experience that includes processing at least 50 murders a year, that we would hire in order to solve the murder of journalist Dada Vujasinović,” he was quoted as saying. He added that the commission members had agreed to send a proposal to the Prosecution and propose coordination so findings of those experts and institutions would be a part of the investigation and relevant for the court proceeding.

“The decision and proposal of the commission were forwarded to the Prosecution on Friday. At the same time, we requested a meeting in order to agree on practical aspects of cooperation on these issues which includes an agreement on how to present the entire documentation regarding the super-expertise that will give credible results that could be defined as indisputable,” the commission on murder of journalists head stressed.

According to him, forensic and ballistics expertise in the Vujasinović case performed at the crime scene and afterward is contradictory and caused doubts and insecurities as to how the journalist died and as a result “upset the family, colleagues and the public”.

“The commission has sent a request to the Prosecution to provide copies of documents in the murder cases of Dada Vujasinović, Slavko Ćuruvija and Milan Pantić. We expect the documents to be submitted to the commission very soon so it could successfully continue its work which is primarily aimed at determining the truth about these murders, which means direct help to prosecutors working on these cases. It is very important to get these documents as soon as possible because the commission is intensively working on the analysis of the existing documents but it also encourages the work of investigative teams that are working on all three cases and who miss parts of documents that the prosecutors obtained outside the police investigation,” Matić stressed and added that the Prosecution was also preparing copies of files in the Ćuruvija and Pantić murder cases.