Dear Madam/Sir,
As you may know, Montenegro is now led by a new government whose leader is Mr Zdravko Krivokapic from the coalition For Montenegro Future (Za Buducnost Crne Gore).
This government is made of several coalitions – of which ones the biggest party is the Democratic Front (DF). The DF leaders have close ties to Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic. One of them, Mr Andrija Mandic – is a proud “Chetnik voivoda”. The “Chetnik voivoda” is a principal commander of the Chetniks military force, the fascist movement which fought on the side on the Nazis in the WWII and whose followers committed many war crimes against non-Serbs in the bloody Bosnian war in 1990s. In addition, the leaders of the DF, who also have close ties to Russia and Kremlin, strongly deny that the Srebrenica genocide in Bosnia ever occurred, thus continuing the similar aggressive and violent rhetoric of the late war criminal Slobodan Milosevic.
One of the smaller parties which participates in the government is the United Reformative Action (URA). Although URA’s official party policy is pro-NATO, pro-EU, and pro-environmentalist, it betrayed its own program. Its actions and words these days are totally opposite to what they claim to be. They claim they want a more democratic and fair society that gives a chance to all. Yet they publicly stated that they want to continue the partocracy by hiring administration with people who support the new government. They claim they want to build a better and more equal society. But they are “building” it with the most retrograde, clerical fascist forces in Montenegro: pro-Russian Democratic Front (DF) and Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC).
The pre-election activities of the DF, the biggest government constituent, were strongly supported by the SOC. In fact, the SOC has selected Mr. Zdravko Krivokapic – the newly appointed Prime Minister- as the leader of the DF’s election list, a fact admitted and confirmed publicly by several DF officials.
The SOC has a strong influence on the politics of the Balkans. Moreover, it is considered to be one of the strongest opponents to Balkans progress towards more democratic and free type of societies and NATO membership. In 2016, the late SPC leader in Montenegro Amfilohije Radovic compared the NATO to Hitler and Mussolini in the light of Montenegro’s accession to the organization while he was also cursing everyone who dares “not to be faithful to mother Russia.”
While many Montenegrins opposed the former ruling Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) for corruption, they are facing even bigger threat today, that of being subjected to retrograde, clerical fascist policies of the new government.
Majority of the Ministers in this new government are hardline Serb nationalists with strong ties to the SOC. Vesna Bratic, the new Minister of Culture, Sport, Media and Education is a person who says that “there is no such thing as Montenegrin ethnicity” while calling the Montenegrins as “the product of ethnical engineering.” As a professor from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Vesna was granted honorary Montenegrin citizenship in 2012 and was given a University professor position at University of Montenegro. Despite all privileges she received as a Serb immigrant, she claims that Serbs do not enjoy the same rights as Montenegrins. She says she is a “Chetnik” (a member of a Serb ultra-nationalist movement that was a Nazi collaborator).
The newly appointed Minister of Justice Mr. Leposavic has been a legal advisor to the SOC in Montenegro on the disputed Law on Religious Expression. He has also publicly showed a fascist three finger symbol of Serb “unity” in front of the Statue of Liberty in New York, the symbol used by Nazy military and its collaborators during WWII.
The new Minister of Health is a sister-in-law of the high-level priest in the SOC church. The same goes for the new Minister of Finance who is also related to the high-level SOC priest. The new Minister of Ecology has also close family and business ties to the SOC in Montenegro. The new Minister of Capital Investment, Mr. Mladen Bojanic was a DF candidate in Montenegro’s Presidential elections in 2018.
In addition, Russia has sided with the SOC in Montenegro during “litias”, the so-called church street protests. In May, Maria Zakharova, the Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, accused the United States of having “an obvious intention to bring a schism into the Orthodox world, to destroy the integrity of the spiritual space in the Balkans,” and of “dividing the Montenegrin people.” Aleksandar Zaldostanov, the leader of the Kremlin-backed biker group The Night Wolves also voiced his support for the SPC-supportive people who protested on streets due to the Law on Freedom of Religion.
We Montenegrins, while some of us being completely non-partisan and even outspoken critics of the former DPS-led government, are now scared for our own survival in our country. We know the results of the aggressive pro-Serbian politics that advocates the idea of Serb unity and aggressive pan-Slavic Orthodoxy. We have seen these policies in action in 90s, first in Croatia, Bosnia and then Kosovo. War lords and pro-Serb politicians were supported and blessed by SOC while they were committing the most horrifying war crimes and crimes against humanity. The outcome of the SOC-supported policies were hundreds of thousands of displaced and killed and whole generations destroyed physically, financially, and emotionally.
Today, Montenegro is a country that is ethnically diverse. It has provided a safe place to live for all cultures and ethnicities since the end of the crisis in 90s. It is a country that opened its doors to Serb and Albanian refugees that came from Bosnia and Kosovo, and now it is facing its own end. Innocent Montenegrin citizens are beaten by mobs who shout “Kosovo is Serbia” and who carry Serbian flags. The Serbian Orthodox Church priests and new ministers violate the COVID-19 social distance rules spreading the deadly decease on a daily basis while the new government constantly accuses the critics who dare to criticize them of being supportive of the former ruling party.
We are scared that we are going back to medieval times. We are now subjected to the rhetoric of late Slobodan Milosevic and the same aggressive policies that led to bloody wars in the past thirty years.
Montenegro, a tiny country in the midst of Europe, has a theocratic government and the world is silently watching it, while Russia and aggressive pro-Serbian ultra-nationalists are acting.
Please help us. Instead of getting democracy and more open society, we got a fundamentalist Orthodox and Serbian-nationalistic government.
Furthermore, we are sending you the evidence: videos/photos of SOC priests blessing war criminals, new government ministers denying Montenegrin identity and proclaiming they are Serb nationalists, priests and newly elected government ministers and prime minister violating COVID-19 rules at the time when Montenegro was facing the highest death rate.
Don’t wait for another Milosevic to happen to us! This is happening now. Close to you. In the midst of Europe. In a tiny little country whose beauty is astonishing. Help us!
