Former Minister of Foreign Affairs and advisor to the former Prime Minister Dritan Abazović for foreign policy Đorđe Radulović is a candidate for the new ambassador of Montenegro to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Vienna, as one of the 12 proposals for which the Government recently requested approval from the host country or international organization, "Vijesti" learns.
Radulović is one of seven career diplomats for whom he is the president of the country Jakov Milatovic informally gave his consent, while for four of the nine candidates from the political quota he requested additional consultations due to the fact that some of them allegedly have dual citizenship and that some allegedly do not support the foreign policy course of Montenegro.
The Constitution stipulates that the President appoints and dismisses ambassadors at the proposal of the Government and with the opinion of the Parliamentary Committee on International Relations.
This will not be Radulović's first diplomatic engagement, because in the period from 2017 to 2020 he was chargé d'affaires and then deputy Montenegrin ambassador to Romania. He headed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MVP) during the government of Zdravko Krivokapić from 2020 to 2022.
According to unofficial information from "Vijesti", candidates from the list of career diplomats are i Borjanka Simićević who is a candidate for the post of ambassador to Ukraine, Cedomir Fustic for the ambassador in Hungary and Andjic station for ambassador in Austria.
Simićević was the secretary of the embassy in Budapest and adviser at the diplomatic representation of Montenegro in Moscow, and at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs she also served as the director of the Directorate for visas, overflights and transit.
Fuštić has been employed in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for more than 20 years in various positions, and currently holds the position of Acting Director General of the General Directorate for Bilateral Affairs and Economic and Cultural Diplomacy. In his career, among other things, he performed the duties of Minister Counselor at the Embassy of Montenegro in Serbia, as well as Head of the Secret Data Registry at the Directorate for NATO.
Anđić was already employed at the Montenegrin embassy in Vienna, where she was the first adviser, while during Radulović's mandate in the MFA she was the director of the Directorate for the United Nations.
"Vijesti" previously announced that the candidate for ambassador to Washington, on the proposal of PES, is a professor at the Faculty of Science and Mathematics in Podgorica. Jovan Mirkovic, for ambassador to Slovenia, the former director of the Post of Montenegro at the proposal of the Democrats Dragan Tufegdzic, for ambassador in North Macedonia at the suggestion of Civis, a former minister without portfolio Zoran Miljanic, for the ambassador in Belgrade at the proposal of the New Serbian Democracy, until recently a member of the Board of Directors of the Airport of Montenegro Nebojsa Djokovic, for the ambassador to Kosovo, the current chargé d'affaires at the embassy there Bernard Čobaj, and for the ambassador of the UN Mission in Geneva Snezana Radović.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Filip Ivanovic he said the day before yesterday in parliament that "appointing an ambassador is one of the priorities of the 44th Government"
"I must point out that the appointment of an ambassador implies strict procedures both from our side and from the host country, and that these procedures are mostly of an internal nature. This means that the names of the proposed ambassadors are not announced to the public until an agreement is obtained, i.e. the consent of the host country", said Ivanović and added that the duration of the procedure varies, but also that the public will be informed in a timely manner about all appointments, and that the Government has adopted proposals for some ambassadors for whom the confirmation of the receiving country is pending.
He announced that a new tour of ambassadors to other vacant posts will soon be proposed.
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). Party Milan Knežević is his original candidate for ambassador to Moscow Miloš Radinović replaced by a party functionary Dragan Bojović, but MVP he did not ask for an agreement from Russia.
According to the Law on Foreign Affairs, politically appointed ambassadors can make up a maximum of 30 percent of heads of diplomatic and consular missions, and that quota is 12 positions.
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. In August of last year, "Vijesti" received 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 Council of Europe. In the meantime, the ambassador from North Macedonia was withdrawn.
Bošković and Bulatović are going to Madrid and Beijing with a political quota
The candidate for ambassador in Madrid, Branko Bošković, was proposed by the Europe Now Movement, while the candidate for ambassador in Beijing, Branko Bulatović, was nominated by New Serbian Democracy (NSD).
Bošković is the president of the Council of the Agency for Electronic Media, and he is currently employed as an assistant professor at the Faculty of Legal Sciences of the University of Donja Gorica.
The NSD candidate, among other things, held the position of assistant director of the Federal Institute for Informatics, and he also held the position of advisor to the Minister of Economy for European integration, that is, assistant to the Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management.
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