Nature is winning the war on guns

The sound of chaktars and church bells is the only thing that will be heard from Sinjajevina, not explosions and detonations, the citizens gathered in front of the Ružica church said yesterday from that mountain.

Several hundred fans of Sinjajevina from almost all Montenegrin cities came to the Okrugljak mountain at noon, and the speakers said that they would defend that mountain with their lives.

They protested the intention of the Ministry of Defense to use that mountain as a military training ground.

On behalf of the organizers, the president of the Association of Bjelopavlića, Ognjen Jovović, addressed the gathering, who invited citizens to sign a declaration for the protection of Sinjajevina.

The moderator of the meeting, Milan Sekulović, urged the gathered not to politicize the meeting, because the only goal is to defend the mountain, regardless of who it is to be defended against.

Livestock breeders Vanja Vuletić and Mileva Gara Jovanović and the president of the Livestock Breeders' Association of Bjelopavlićka Sinjajevina Vesko Lakić talked about the importance of the Sinjajeva pasture for the development of livestock farming.

"We pray for you and we ask you who are here and those who are not, to save Sinjajevina," said Lakić.

He added that the Ministry of Defense is trying to do something that civilization does not know: "To destroy it. What about the waters that flow into all the municipalities below? What about the air and all the other goods provided by Sinjajevina?".

He also said that Sinjajevina is the heart of Montenegro and called on all citizens to defend it together.

"Sinjajevina is not the birthplace of the reborn government and their NATO father, but the age-old cradle of our ancestors and us, their descendants," said Tomislav Jelić from Uskoče Bar yesterday. He said that those who build on Sinjajevina and who spent most of their lives on it were not driven away by long winters, roadlessness, or blizzards.

"Neither our ancestors nor us, their descendants forced us to give up Sinjajevina, neither will the machinery of the Army of Montenegro," he said.

"Sinjajevina is my mother, she raised me and my children. I am here today, like all of you, to stop any military activities at the cost of my life," said Mileva Jovanović.

He told Defense Minister Predrag Bošković and President Milo Đukanović to know whose orders they were carrying out.

"We free-minded citizens of Danilovgrad, Žabljak, Šavnik, Mojkovac, Kolašin, are ready to defend Sinjajevina with our lives," he said.

Aleksandar Perović from Ozon said that the strongest Montenegrin army is the people who defend its nature.

"We are the ones who know what we have, we are the ones who will not allow them to take our rivers, mountains, and make us slaves. We are the army that will preserve every inch of this country and we will not allow anyone to destroy it," Perović said.

Veselin Drljević from Bjelopol invited the gathered people to come to the Savina waters on July 13 and show once again that they will not allow the destruction of Sinjajevina.

“There are many of us. Let them not think that it will be easy to build here. Life here is the cheapest," said Drljević.

Aleksandar Milatović, a citizen of Danilovgrad, said that the Army plans to practice on more than one hundred million square meters.

"We are forced to defend our state and our country against our own army and I think it is more than devastating," he said, saying that they want an ecological Sinjajevina.

The participants of the meeting asked the leaders of the five municipalities that gravitate to Sinjajevina - to stand with the people and declare that mountain a regional nature park, as was foreseen in the project.

With the consent of the Government, the representatives of five Montenegrin municipalities spent the money according to plan and in April 2018 completed the regional nature park project...

However, almost simultaneously, the Ministry of Defense announced that military exercises would be conducted on that mountain.

The two municipalities to which that mountain belongs territorially and traditionally, Mojkovac and Kolašin, gave their consent to the Ministry of Defense to build a military training ground on Sinjajevina, despite the protest of many citizens.

Danilovgrad and Žabljak did not agree with the plans of the Ministry, while Šavnik was not asked anything about it.

The Ministry of Agriculture did not give consent to the Ministry of Defense to build a military shooting range in Sinjajevina.

The department, which is now headed by Milutin Simović, did so after the Forestry Administration declared in June 2016 that the construction of a military shooting range in Sinjajevina could endanger forests and the ecological system.

The Army shooting range will occupy an area of ​​six by 18 kilometers, and the location enters the zone provided for in the protection plan.

Results

Five Montenegrin municipalities spent around 300.000 euros in the area where Defense Minister Predrag Bošković envisioned a training ground to put the area under protection.

From the Delegation of the European Union in Podgorica, "Vijesti" was informed that they financed 67 percent of the project "Sinjajevina - Feasibility Study and Design of Asphalting of the Main Road Network".

They explained that the project started on December 26, 2013 and lasted for 35 months.

They pointed out that the project holder was financed by the Municipality of Mojkovac, and the participants were the municipalities of Kolašin, Žabljak, Šavnik, Danilovgrad and that out of the total budget of 290.494,47 euros, the EU financed 194.631,29 euros.

"Results: Prepared and approved conservation study for the Regional Park; Established association of producers; Mapping hiking, cycling, skiing and displaying eco-tourism locations; Feasibility study and technical project for the reconstruction of the manufactured road network; A functional inter-municipal mechanism for the management of the Sinjajevina Regional Park has been established," says the reply from the EU Delegation in Podgorica.

The army didn't practice on the mountain before?

Despite claims from the Ministry of Defense that they had practiced shooting in Sinjajevina before, the available data show that this is not true.

Allegedly, neither the Yugoslav People's Army, nor the Army of Serbia and Montenegro have ever used the area of ​​Sinjajevija for training, nor have any military exercises been conducted since 1945.

"The only presence of the army was during the construction of the road Boan-Krnja Jela-Miosko, in the 70s of the last century, and it was not a military exercise.

At that time, the army avoided conducting exercises in areas of untouched nature. The only military training ground in the immediate vicinity was the barracks in Žabljak, intended for the training of mountain and reconnaissance units," said an interlocutor from military circles.

He explained that there was a Radovče training ground in Montenegro, near Danilovgrad, intended for conducting military exercises with combat shooting of weapons of a caliber greater than 20 mm. "Military ranges for shooting with infantry weapons were in the Danilovgrad barracks, in Zlatica (Podgorica), Kunovo (Nikšić), Ranche (Pljevlja) and Volujica (Bar)," explained the same source.