The review of the indictment against defendants Radoje Zvicer, Vaso Ulic, Slobodan Kašćelan and others accused of smuggling two and a half tons of cocaine is scheduled for March 14th at the Higher Court in Podgorica.
The major international operation "General", aimed at dismantling organized crime groups involved in cocaine smuggling from South America to Europe and Australia, was carried out on July 17, 2024.
That day, Vaso and Nikola Ulić, Vukan (Vinetu) Čoković Matić, Viktor Drešaj, Radomir Dobriša, Petar Miranović, Marinko Prelević and Veselin Paro Pavličić were deprived of their liberty.
Criminal charges were also filed against Radoje Zvicer, Dragan Pavličević, Vuk Vulević, Radul Božović, Ivan Delić and Leon Drešaj, who carried out the arrest that day, as well as against the previously arrested Milo Božović, Damir Mandić, Vjekoslav Lambulić and Radovan Pantović.
In security circles, Operation "General" has been labeled as one of the most important blows to the mafia, given the names on the nineteen-member list of suspects for transnational cocaine smuggling.
The Montenegrin Special State Prosecutor's Office (SDT) and the Special Police Department (SPO) have been closely cooperating with the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (EUROPOL), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in this endeavor for months. ) and the Australian Federal Police (AFP).
According to the knowledge of Vijesta, it is the first time that the US DEA and FBI are directly participating in an investigation with the Special Police Department.
Vaso Ulić and Radoje Zvicer are cited as the leaders of a criminal organization accused of smuggling around 2,5 tons of cocaine, among whose members are prisoners with long prison terms, such as Damir Mandić, but also members of the notorious "Amerika" clan, active since the XNUMXs. ..
Some of the defendants in that case have been among the main players in criminal circles around the world for more than two decades - Ulić, Zvicer, Veselin Paro Pavličić, Vukan (Vinetu) Čoković Matić, Vuk Vulević, Ivan Delić, the brothers Viktor and Leon Drešaj, Vjekoslav Lambulić...
This is confirmed by the official statements of the Police Directorate, which wrote in a statement after the operation that "leaders and high-ranking members of high-risk organized crime groups, with many years of continuity in carrying out criminal activities in the field of organized crime, were also deprived of their freedom."
When the operation was carried out, Vijesti was told that Montenegrin investigators were provided with an extensive package of intelligence on the illegal activities of members of the criminal group who had been under a kind of surveillance for a long time...
He said that the list of those arrested is not final and that there are connected individuals, and that "the investigation should go to the very top of the state and the previous government."
"We are talking about persons who have been misled for decades in the intelligence data of foreign services, who have information about their contacts with former officials of the security services in Montenegro, under whose cloak and protection many were untouchable. They are large international smugglers of tobacco and narcotics. Only now have the conditions for international action been created. Previously, it was not possible due to the fear of constant data leakage and the involvement of former security and political structures," said the newspaper's source.
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