Serbia's Postelection Reckoning: Arrests Mount as Prosecutors Move on Long-Stalled Cases

Air Serbia flight JU134 was already deep in Lithuanian airspace on November 3, on its way from Belgrade to Moscow, when the crew was told to turn around and fly back to the Serbian capital. Aboard were three senior figures from the era of former President Aleksandar Vucic: Aleksandar Vulin, a former defense and interior minister and ex-head of the Security Intelligence Agency (BIA); Dusan Bajatovic, the long-serving director of the state-owned gas company Srbijagas; and Nenad Popovic, a minister without portfolio.

All three are known in Serbia for close ties to Russia and for controversies that include reports of corruption and abuse of public office. Since 2023, Vulin has been under US sanctions, which Washington justified by citing corrupt and destabilizing activities that undermine the rule of law in the Western Balkans. According to unofficial reports in several outlets, the plane was recalled over a security breach: Vulin allegedly boarded without the mandatory screening. Vulin said he was going to Moscow to discuss extending a gas agreement with Russia. Bajatovic said he did not know why Vulin and Popovic were travelling and denied that the two would attend the scheduled gas-supply meetings.

The episode might have stayed a curiosity had it not come nine days after the October 25 parliamentary election, in which the student-backed list beat the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) by a landslide and ended 14 years of dominance by Vucic and the SNS. The new majority has not yet taken control of any levers of power. Even so, arrests, new criminal proceedings and the reopening of unresolved cases have followed at remarkable speed, and some of them touch the foundations of the system built under the SNS.

Prosecutors have opened a series of investigations into suspected electoral manipulation, corruption and abuse of office. Four people were arrested in Novi Sad on suspicion of vote-buying. Six were detained in Mali Zvornik on suspicion of helping citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina register residence in Serbia so they could vote.

One of the most prominent cases is that of Davor Macura, owner of Alta Bank, suspected of illegally entering the bank's vault and removing the equivalent of about €383 million ($430 million). He was arrested days after the National Bank of Serbia revoked the bank's license and began bankruptcy proceedings. Macura has been publicly associated with the SNS, and his bank did significant business with the state and had many Russian clients. Senior police officials, the head of the Republic Hydrometeorological Institute and several managers of public companies have also been arrested over suspected abuses of office and rigged procurement.

There are also worries about evidence. After the vote, reports and video footage suggested that official documents may have been removed or destroyed in state institutions and public companies. On October 29, Prosecutor General Zagorka Dolovac issued a binding instruction to all chief public prosecutors to prevent the destruction of official and other records. The Students' List urged employees of state bodies and the media to report any destruction, which it described as abuse by the outgoing authorities. Prosecutor Bojana Savovic notes that even an attempt to destroy official records is punishable.

Savovic reads the sudden activity skeptically. She told DW it paints a sad picture of the prosecution service, which she sees as trying to ingratiate itself with the new authorities by showing what it could have done but was unwilling to do until ten days earlier. She hopes speed will not cost the quality of indictments, and that the cases are not personal vendettas within the old regime. Tanja Arsic, an incoming MP for the Students' List, says the law always allowed action, but people obstructed the system by putting cases in drawers.

Whether investigations will reach the top is open. Vucic says he is not afraid of arrest and that nothing financial will be found against him, because he does not sign or do anything involving money. Accountability, though, also means establishing who made decisions, gave orders and held real power over the deals under investigation. Arsic fears the biggest players might be prosecuted on thin evidence, or charged with something far less serious than what they did, and warns that acquittals from rushed cases would be disastrous.

Savovic says success will be measured by final convictions and permanent confiscation of criminally acquired assets, not popular arrests. She doubts it is achievable without fundamental changes in the judiciary, police and security structures, which she says long promoted people for obedience and self-censorship. The verdicts will show whether Serbia is breaking with its old system of power or just swapping one set of power brokers for another.