18. 10. 2012

Insider team banned from joint N. Kosovo municipal session

Leposavic, October 18, 2012 (B92) - B92's investigative program Insider team was not allowed to attend a joint session of four northern Kosovo municipalities in Leposavić on Thursday.

The session was open to public.

The Insider team has learnt that adoption of a conclusion condemning Insider will be on the agenda and decided to go to Kosovo and ask the councilors, representatives of all parties, whether the condemnation was aimed at defending the pillage, uncontrolled spending of the budget or individuals named in the program.

Insider series dubbed Patriotic Pillage has revealed numerous abuses, misappropriations of funds intended for the poorest citizens in Kosovo as well as smuggling of VAT-free goods that deprived the Serbian budget of millions of euros each year.

A dozen young men who said they worked for the Culture Center told the Insider team that they had been ordered not to allow B92 reporters to attend the session which was open to public. One of the explanations was that the municipal representatives had requested that B92 reporters be banned in order to avoid incidents.

Representatives of other media were allowed to attend the meeting and nobody protested over the fact that the Insider team was denied the right to report about the session.

The councilors of four northern Kosovo municipalities adopted the conclusion urging the authorities to "investigate the spending of the budget funds" and to take all legal measures against individuals who embezzled the funds.

"We condemn the orchestrated campaigns of some media (B92) that satanize the entire Serbian people in Kosovo and Metohija and that especially focus on Serbs in the north of the province and the spending of the budget funds in order to destroy the citizens' unity and cause confrontations with other citizens of the state of Serbia," reads the conclusion which was unanimously adopted.