Tobacco, machines and Mrkić's man: The fugitive has been considered an important link in the so-called Mojkovac clan for more than a decade

More than 40 packages of cut and leaf tobacco, weighing a total of 13,5 tons, machines and raw materials for cigarette packaging were found in a warehouse in Danilovgrad, which investigators suspect were part of an illegal cigarette production facility, which they believe is controlled by fugitives. Aleksandar Aco Mrkic.

Mrkić, a fugitive from Interpol's wanted list, has been known for more than a decade as an important link in the so-called Mojkovac clan.

In the warehouses in the Spuk settlement of Grbe, where Danilovgrad inspectors and their colleagues from the Crime Suppression Sector also found a production facility, the police spent two days inventorying the tobacco, machines, and other equipment found.

The Police Directorate announced last night that they had conducted a search of an illegally built warehouse, located on Aleksandar Mrkić's land in the town of Grbe, which was attended by the tenant of the facility. Z. B.

"13.500 kilograms of tobacco - both cut and in sheets - were found in the facility, as well as several machines of various models and years of production for processing tobacco, and raw materials for cigarette packaging. The facility has been sealed or blocked, and the aforementioned items and objects have been temporarily seized. Further police and prosecutorial activities and detailed checks are underway, the outcome of which will be announced to the public in due course, after the investigation conducted under the jurisdiction of the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica."

"Vijesti" reporters noted yesterday that the action is continuing for a second day.

An accused member of Mrkić's criminal organization was also questioned as part of the investigation. Željko Bulatović, for whom, according to the newspaper's information, the police are investigating what role he played in the functioning of the warehouse and production facility.

After his interrogation and the completion of police actions, a decision from the competent prosecutor's office on further action is awaited.

"Vijesti"'s interlocutors claim that more than forty packages of cut tobacco, or slightly more than 13 tons, were found in the facilities.

Along with the huge amount of tobacco, the police also found machines for processing it, including equipment that once belonged to the Tobacco Factory.

It is precisely because of the equipment found that investigators suspect that the facilities were not used only as warehouses, but that tobacco was processed, packaged, and prepared for the production of cigarettes intended for the illegal market.

"It is suspected that this space was also used for the production of tobacco products that were smuggled into the European market," one of the interlocutors of "Vijesti" said two days ago.

According to the same information, officers from the Crime Suppression Department and the Danilovgrad police previously located the facilities, after which a multi-day search operation began.

In parallel with the searches, investigators are determining who participated in organizing the business, who delivered the tobacco, where the finished products ended up, and whether the facility was part of Aleksandar Mrkić's wider smuggling network.

Mrkić on the run, Veljović indicted

Aleksandar Aco Mrkić was charged before the Higher Court in Podgorica with forming a criminal organization in 2018 whose goal, according to the Special State Prosecutor's Office, was to smuggle cigarettes from the Port of Bar Free Zone and launder money.

Among the defendants is the former director of the Police Directorate, Veselin Veljović, who the Special State Prosecutor's Office charges with being a member of that organization and providing Mrkić with confidential police information in order to assist him in cigarette smuggling.

Mrkić is on the run, and at the request of the Montenegrin police, an international Interpol arrest warrant was issued and made public for him.

The long-serving first police officer is not the only one in Mrkić's clan - special prosecutors have also accused former Bar Criminal Police Chief Ilija Vasović of subordinating his official position to the fugitive's criminal organization and helping them in cigarette smuggling and money laundering.

Mrkić is also mentioned in other cases of the Special State Prosecutor's Office (SDT) as one of the actors in cigarette smuggling whose activities were monitored by members of competing criminal groups.

“Vijesti” was founded in early 2011, through a series of investigative articles by the journalist Oliver Lakic, raised questions about the "Tara" cigarette factory in Polje near Mojkovac, but also in the hangar in Donja Gorica, whose owner was Aleksandar Mrkić.

Lakić investigated whether, in addition to legal production, fake cigarette brands were being produced, stored, and prepared for smuggling at these locations.

The current editor of the Libertas portal said in court back in July 2011 that she believed that the person who spoke to her on the phone while she was in front of the Tara factory, introducing herself as Vujica Tomović, was actually Aleksandar Mrkić.

After "Vijesti" wrote, the then Supreme State Prosecutor's Office announced that it was checking both the factory in Mojkovac and the hangar of brothers Aleksandar and Nikola Mrkić.

Bulatović's name was mentioned even then - he was listed as the general distributor of cigarettes and director of "Montenegro Duvan Komerc".

According to data from the Central Registry published by "Vijesti" in 2015, he was the founder of "Montenegro Duvan Komerc", a company associated with the "Montenegro Tobacco Company" (MTC), within which the controversial "Tara" cigarette factory in Mojkovac operated.

During several years of inspections, the prosecution investigated suspicions that it was producing fake cigarette brands intended for smuggling, while the company claimed that the inspections were completed without determining their criminal liability.

What happened to some of the material collected during those checks has never been fully clarified. The then Chief Special Prosecutor Milivoje Katnic In November 2015, speaking about the investigation of the Mojkovac tobacco factory, he said that certain evidence had "most likely emigrated and been lost permanently."

"The proceedings regarding the tobacco factory in Mojkovac were conducted several years ago and certain evidence was most likely emigrated and lost permanently. What we have now, the prosecution is trying to establish," Katnić said at the time.

"Vijesti" in 2023, after the SDT action in which Veselin Veljović, Nikola Mrkić and Mujo Nikocevic, announced that Aleksandar Mrkić has been known for more than a decade as an important link in the organization of cigarette smuggling for the so-called Mojkovac clan.

Then the story from 2011 was reopened - that Olivera Lakić, before she was threatened and beaten in front of the building where she lives in 2012, was investigating Mrkić's tobacco business, the "Tara" factory and the warehouse in Donja Gorica.

It was never determined who ordered the attack on her.