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Serbian PEP unable to explain €244,620

Chris Hamblin, Editor, London, 5 October 2017

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Defence minister Aleksandar Vulin has been unable to prove to Serbia's anti-corruption authorities that €244,620 (£218,327) with which he bought a flat in Belgrade came from a legitimate source.

The minister allegedly made false declarations about his wealth in the course of the usual round of disclosures that holders of public office have to make before taking up their duties. According to the Serbian press, this 'politically exposed person' (PEP) told the Anti-Corruption Agency that the money came from his aunt's aunt in Canada. Suspecting that he had committed a criminal offence, the agency reported him to the prosecutors more than two years ago. In true opaque continental European governmental style, only a leaked dossier brought this subject to public attention recently.

Vulin founded the Movement of Socialists in August 2008. This party is now part of Serbia's coalition government. He has held his present cabinet post since 29 June, having held several others over the years. He is a loyal follower of President Aleksandar Vučić's.

The disappearing dossier

Not only did the agency find that Vulin had no evidence of any legally acquired money for the purchase of the 1,150-square-foot flat; it also unearthed other inconsistencies in his disclosures. He gave it two versions of the story of how he had come by the money and also sent it unsigned statements and other suspicious evidence. Further enquiries showed that his stories did not stand up. The agency put all this into a report and forwarded it to the Prosecutor's Office for Organised Crime, but kept it secret from the public. It was only after somebody sent some sort of appeal document to Rodoljub Sabic, the "commissioner for information of public importance and data protection," that it fell into the hands of a journalist linked to the Crime and Corruption Reporting Network (KRIK) of Serbia.

The KRIK also reported last month that a Serbian court had ruled that 2½ acres of land illegally acquired by Belgrade’s mayor and his father 12 years ago must be returned to the state.

Squirming on the hook

According to the Belgrade press, Vulin's contract said that he made the first payment of €40,000 in October 2011, with the rest falling due at the end of September 2012. The only real estate that Vulin owned before this, as KRIK had already discovered, was a one-bedroom flat in Novi Sad. In 2012 he sold it to his brother for €38,000. He later told the agency that he paid for the flat in Zvezdara out of this sale, although of course it could not even have covered the first payment.

The agency asked Vulin to explain himself, whereupon he changed his story and said that he and his wife Nataša had borrowed €205,000 from her aunt's aunt in Canada. As evidence, he handed in a receipt bearing the signature of his wife. This said that she had received the money and that she and Vulin would pay it back in ten years' time. The aunt's signature was, apparently, not there. Press reports say, moreover, that Vulin was legally obliged to report debts of this type to the authorities but did not do so.

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