The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MVP) asked 12 countries and international organizations for agreements, that is, consent to accept the same number of candidates for ambassadors of Montenegro, "Vijesti" has learned unofficially.
At the session held on April 4, the government established a list of 12 candidates, but it is not clear whether there are names among them that were not supported by the President of Montenegro, Jakov Milatović, in informal consultations.
According to the unofficial information of "Vijesti", the candidate for ambassador in Vasingotin is Jovan Mirković, a professor at the Faculty of Science in Podgorica, for the ambassador in Slovenia, the former director of the Post of Montenegro Dragan Tufegdžić, for the ambassador in North Macedonia, the former minister without portfolio Zoran Miljanić, for the ambassador in Belgrade, the recent member of the Board of Directors of the Airport of Montenegro, Nebojsa Đoković, for the ambassador in Kosovo, the current chargé d'affaires at the embassy there, Bernard Čobaj, and for the ambassador of the UN Mission in Geneva, Snežana Radović.
One of the sources of "Vijesti" said that the list refers to both career diplomats and candidates for ambassadors from the political quota.
The interlocutor said that the names of all candidates will be known when the agreements arrive at the MFA. Then, he stated, the Parliamentary Committee for International Relations and Emigrants will give its opinion on the candidates, after which Milatović should appoint them.
The Constitution stipulates that the president appoints and dismisses ambassadors at the proposal of the Government and with the opinion of the board.
At the end of March, Milatović gave his approval in principle for the appointment of 12 of the 16 ambassadors proposed to him by the Government. He supported all seven proposals from career diplomats, while for four out of nine candidates from the political quota, he requested additional consultations because some of them allegedly have dual citizenship and some allegedly do not support Montenegro's foreign policy course.
Milatović had objections to the candidates for ambassadors in Berlin and Madrid, proposed by the Europe Now Movement (PES), and Athens and Moscow, proposed by the New Serbian Democracy (NSD), that is, the Democratic People's Party (DNP).
DNP, after their candidate for the position of ambassador in Moscow, Miloš Radinović, gave up that position, proposed their official Dragan Bojović for that position. The source did not want to reveal whether the other parties also proposed new candidacies after Milatović's remarks.
According to "Vijesti" unofficial information, the candidate for ambassador in Athens was dentist Ivana Živković, acting director general of the Directorate for Public Health and Biomedicine in the Ministry of Health, while the candidate for ambassador in Berlin was entrepreneur Miljan Zečević, who member of the Initial Board of PES in Pljevlja.
According to the Law on Foreign Affairs, politically appointed ambassadors can make up a maximum of 30 percent of the heads of diplomatic and consular missions.
In August of last year, "Vijesti" was provided with data from the MFA, according to which Montenegro has ambassadors at only ten addresses in the world, while chargé d'affaires represent it at twice as many.
According to these data, Montenegro had ambassadors in only seven countries - Belgium, Greece, Italy, North Macedonia, Russia, Turkey and France, and in four missions to the EU, UN and other international organizations (Geneva), OSCE and the Council of Europe. In the meantime, the ambassador from North Macedonia was withdrawn.
Soon about the new group of candidates
The source of "Vijesti" said that soon there should be discussions about a new group of candidates, who should fill some of the remaining vacant ambassadorial positions.
He states that among them there will be two more candidates from the political quota, and that the rest will be career diplomats.
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