I cannot speak to exactly how Serbia will respond to INTERPOL’s ‘red notice’, the US ambassador said today after a series of media reports that an arrest warrant was issued against Milan Radoičić for the attack in the village of Banjska on September 24. Hovenier said that there are several examples of a country refusing to extradite a certain individual to another country, despite requests to do so.
During today’s visit to South Mitrovica, Hovenier was asked about whether the West will take measures against official Belgrade if it fails to extradite Radoičić.
While condemning the events in Banjska on September 24, the ambassador reiterated that everyone who participated in the „criminal attack“ should be held accountable.
„We expect that to happen and we have made that very clear to the authorities in Serbia and other authorities,“ he said.
Hovenier said that the US is very interested in finding out exactly what happened in Banjska.
„We have been doing our own assessment of that, largely relying, but not solely, on information provided by the government of Kosovo. That assessment is still underway,“ he said.
Commenting on Radoičić, the US ambassador said that he cannot speak about whether Serbia will or will not „respond to INTERPOL’s ‘red notice'“.
However, he noted that there are several examples of a country requesting extradition through INTERPOL, without it ever happening.
„A red notice simply asks governments to potentially arrest someone on the basis of one country’s legal process. But there are a number of times, on the basis of a ‘red notice’, in many countries, a given government determines not to take any action to extradite on the basis of a red notice. There have to be extradition treaties in place. There have to be many other conditions.”
An international warrant was allegedly issued for Milan Radoičić for the attack in the village of Banjska on September 24, the media unofficially reported last week.
The news was later confirmed by the chief prosecutor of the Special Prosecutor’s Office, Blerim Isufaj, as well as the Kosovo Minister for Communities and Return, Nenad Rašić.
Isufaj did not respond to our calls and messages. In a statement for Klan Kosovam Isufaj confirmed that a request to issue an „INTERPOL warrant“ for Milan Radoičić as the main organizer of the attack in Banjska had been submitted, and that additional warrants for 11 other persons in connection with the same case will be submitted in the coming days.
He did not specify whether the Special Prosecutor’s Office sent the request to UNMIK or whether UNMIK had already informed INTERPOL about it.
Since Kosovo is not a member of INTERPOL, UNMIK mediates requests for issuing international warrants.
UNMIK officially did not want to talk about individual persons, as well as whether they had already sent a request to INTERPOL.
In their response to KoSSev, they stated that they process all requests they receive from the Kosovo authorities for the issuance of international wanted notices and then, if necessary, communicate them to INTERPOL.
“In line with the 2002 Memorandum of Understanding between INTERPOL and UNMIK, UNMIK performs the tasks of an INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB) and facilitates international police cooperation between Kosovo law enforcement agencies and INTERPOL member States. Accordingly, UNMIK processes all requests received from Kosovo authorities for the issuance of International Wanted Notices and communicates them as appropriate to INTERPOL for review in line with INTERPOL’s procedures.”
According to KoSSev’s unofficial findings, this list, along with Radoičić, contains at least 20 people suspected of participating in Banjska events. Their initials have been published by the Kosovo media. Most of them come from the north of Kosovo.
By the time this news was published, INTERPOL’s red notice database still did not contain any of the 21 persons from that alleged list, including Milan Radoičić.
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