The Ministry of Defense and the Army of Montenegro (VCG) will no longer prevent the competent authorities from removing the illegally placed memorial plaque on the building of the former camp in Morinje.
This stems from the answers that "Vijesti" received from the department headed by him Dragan Krapović (Democrats), to the question - why for two years the Ministry and the Croatian Ministry of Interior have been preventing the implementation of the order of the Directorate for Inspection Affairs (UIP) to remove the sign from the once active military facility.
"The Ministry of Defense, i.e. Minister Krapović, has repeatedly told the public that, although he does not agree with either the manner or the inscription of the memorial plaque placed on the building in Morinje, it is not within the competence of our department to remove it. According to the findings of competent inspections, the memorial plaque was installed contrary to the law. The facility in Morinje is secured by the Army, like any other military facility, by order of the Chief of the General Staff. However, the VCG will not prevent the competent state authorities from implementing the law and doing their job," the Ministry told "Vijesta".
Soldiers guarding the facility by order of the head of the VCG General Staff Zoran Lazarevic, until now, on several occasions, they have prevented municipal inspectors and municipal police officers from entering the perimeter of that facility and removed the board from one of the supporting ziods, which was installed on October 10, 2022 by the then ministers of foreign affairs. Ranko Krivokapic (SDP) and defense Rasko Konjević (former SDP official) with his Croatian colleagues, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Gordan Grlić Radman (HDZ) and Minister of Croatian Veterans Tom Medved (HDZ).
At the unveiling ceremony of the plaque, which treats the historical circumstances of 1991 in a controversial way, when the state of Montenegro was an undoubted participant in the aggression against Croatia, and the plaque in that context only mentions the "Greater Sprague aggression", the then Montenegrin minister without portfolio also supported them. Adrian Vuksanovic (HGI).
In the then military warehouses in Morinje in the fall of 1991, the so-called collection center for prisoners of war from the Dubrovnik battlefield, where numerous captured members of the Croatian forces defending Konavle and Dubrovnik from the raiding raids of Montenegrin reservists in JNA uniforms were held, as well as many Croatian civilians from that territory. A few years ago, the Montenegrin judiciary passed several convictions against the former guards in that collection center, stating that they had committed war crimes because they beat and abused the detainees.
The Inspection Department for the Protection of Cultural Property and Cultural Heritage of the UIP stated that the memorial plaque was installed "without documentation proving that the plaque in question is in the Memorial Program adopted by the Kotor Municipal Assembly, nor that there is consent from the Government of Montenegro because it is being done about an event for which the prescribed 50 years have not passed since the moment of occurrence".
Therefore, on October 18, 2022, the state inspection passed a decision on the removal of the memorial plaque and obliged the Municipality of Kotor to implement it. However, the intervention of the Communal Inspection and the Kotor Communal Police on October 24 was prevented by the Army, whose members have been guarding the completely abandoned former military facility since the installation of the memorial plaque.
The soldiers who guard the locked gate at the entrance to the complex 24 hours a day and who have so far prevented the intervention of the Communal Inspection and Communal Police on several occasions, are doing so under the next Chief of General Staff. The order according to which uniformed and armed soldiers must secure the abandoned former military facility 24 hours a day, where there is no electricity, water, or basic living conditions, was issued when Konjević was at the head of the Ministry, but it has not been repealed even to this day, although since then changed two more ministers of defense - Filip Adzic as department coordinator (GP URA) and current minister Krapović.
"During the Great Sprague aggression against Croatia, the so-called Center Morinj (October 3, 10 - August 1991, 18) was a camp here for detained Croatian civilians and defenders. We remember the crimes committed to disgrace the name and spirit of Montenegro. We express our regret for all the suffering experienced by the detainees. May it never happen again!" is the text on the memorial board.
Because they failed to remove it and comply with the order issued by the inspection, the Administration imposed fines on the Municipality of Kotor and, until recently, its president Vladimir Jokić (Democrats), but she ordered that the local government not pay them, as he himself did not pay that fine.
"The state in the form of three ministers in the government at the time, without the knowledge of the local administration and against the law, first erected a memorial plaque in Morinje, and then the same state in the form of the UIP passed a decision on the removal of the illegally placed memorial and ordered the Municipality of Kotor to implement it and remove the plaque. Then the same state, in the form of the Army of Montenegro, demanded that the plaque not be removed and repeatedly prevented the Communal Inspection and the Communal Police of the Municipality of Kotor from implementing the decision of the UIP on the removal of an illegally placed sign. That's why it doesn't even occur to me to voluntarily pay this fine," Jokic told "Vijesta" at the time.
In August of last year, the Basic State Prosecutor's Office (ODT) in Kotor dismissed the criminal complaint against Krivokapić and Konjević for erecting a memorial plaque. The criminal complaint against them was submitted to the Special State Prosecutor's Office by the Administration, whose acting inspector established that Krivokapić and Konjević illegally erected a memorial plaque in October 2022. The inspection claimed that Krivokapić and Konjević committed a criminal offense under Article 411a of the Criminal Code, which refers to the violation and illegal erection of monuments.
The former Morinj military warehouse has not been an active military facility since 2006. Then it was declared unpromising and redundant for the needs of the Croatian Ministry of Finance and placed at the disposal of the Ministry of Finance, which manages state assets, for further valorization. When asked if and when the Ministry formally requested from the Government or the Ministry of Finance or the Ministry of Urbanism, Spatial Planning and State Property the return to possession of the former military facility, and if so, why it was requested, from the department headed by Krapović, "Vijesti" was not precise answered, as well as the question of what is the current purpose of this facility for which the Ministry uses it, which would justify the twenty-four-hour presence of the military guard in it.
"The former military warehouse 'Morinj' is a location managed by the Ministry. During 2014, this location was proposed for valorization through a private public partnership, but the valorization did not occur due to the lack of interested partners for its valorization. Taking into account the fact that the location in question is still a location managed by the Ministry, in order to prevent devastation, it is secured by the Army, and the use of the Army for this purpose is defined by the decisions of the Chief of General Staff," they said.
Ministry: The army will not prevent the authorities from doing their work
The Ministry did not give a precise answer to "News", which is why they and the VCG have so far not allowed the implementation of the decision of the inspection to remove the memorial plaque, that is, to comment on whether this behavior of the Ministry contributes to the functioning of the system's institutions and the rule of law.
"The facility in Morinje is secured by the Croatian Armed Forces, like any other military facility, by order of the Chief of the General Staff. However, the VCG will not prevent the competent state authorities from enforcing the law and doing their job," said the Ministry of Defense.
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