Stanković: "Envelope" is not the job of MPs

Supreme State Prosecutor Ivica Stanković refused to submit to the Parliamentary Anti-Corruption Committee a special report on the "Envelope" affair, i.e. the investigation into the money that businessman Duško Knežević gave to the former mayor of Podgorica, Slavoljub Stijepović, and which was allegedly used for the DPS campaign in Zeta.

In a letter to the chairman of the board, Predrag Bulatović, he explained that the Parliament and its bodies exercise political control, while the courts deal with legal control.

He explained that this is why the prosecution cannot declare specific cases, even though there is already a parliamentary practice for this since the formation of the Anti-corruption Committee and other parliamentary bodies.

Half a year has passed since the video was published showing how the owner of "Atlas Group" and accused of multimillion-dollar embezzlement, Duško Knežević, who was on good terms with the authorities at the time, handing the envelope to Stijepović.

She has not yet received a judicial epilogue, and Stijepović admitted in the prosecution that he took the money and distributed it to DPS activists.

At the hearing at the prosecutor's office, they confirmed this, the interlocutor told "Vijesta", but the results of the investigation have not yet resulted in an indictment. The Agency for Prevention of Corruption fined DPS for misdemeanor.

The board requested that the VDT and the chief special prosecutor Milivoje Katnić come to the control hearing in September, and that before that the SDT submit a report on the investigation into the "Envelope" affair. Katnić previously refused, also stating that the Law on State Prosecution does not stipulate the obligation of the SDT to report to the competent working body of the Assembly on the work of the prosecution in specific cases "and especially not on the actions taken and their content".

The GST, as well as the VDT to which the Committee addressed, stated that the prosecutors are obliged to submit periodic reports on their work at the request of the Assembly and the Committee for the Political System.

Today, Predrag Bulatović will send invitations to Stanković and Katnic for the session on September 11. Bulatović told "Vijesta" yesterday that the letter from the VDT showed that Katnić is the head of the Prosecutor's Office, and Stanković is under his control.

"The way of interpreting the law and the Rules of Procedure is according to Katnić's model - 'set a goal, and adapt the interpretation of the law to it'. The goal here is not to consider the 'Envelope', to cover it up and introduce it into a flow that corresponds to the top of the DPS", Bulatović assessed.

He pointed out that it is "good for one's career" to reject the Committee whose president is from the Democratic Front, regardless of the fact that they are also trying to marginalize the DPS MPs, because they also voted to request a report.

Directed deputies to the announcement, unified investigation

"There is no legal basis for demanding, or even for submitting an individual report on any specific case, because in that way they would enter the sphere of possible violations of the Constitution and the law," states Ivica Stanković's reply to Bulatović. It also says that the SDT made a statement on its website about the handling of the so-called "Envelope" affair.

Television Vijesti announced recently that the "Envelope" was probably combined with the original investigation from 2017 when the drivers of Atlas Bank were suspected. Knežević then claimed that they were innocent, while Stijepović denied that he had taken any money from Knežević, only to be denied by the recording a year and a half later.

In the prosecution's response to TV, it is written that the investigation is being conducted against eight persons, of which seven are being prosecuted for creating a criminal organization and money laundering, and one is being prosecuted for money laundering (Stijepović).