Podgorica, (MINA) – Dozens of members of high-risk organized crime groups may leave the Administration for the Execution of Criminal Sanctions (UIKS) by the end of the year, due to the inefficiency of court proceedings and their failure to deliver verdicts within deadline defined by law, it was announced at the session of the Bureau for Operational Coordination (BOK).

During the session attended by the Minister of Internal Affairs, Danilo Saranovic, and at which several issues related to the activities of intelligence and security sector were discussed, it was announced that urgent amendments to the Code of Criminal Procedure should be adopted.

Bureau coordinator Aleksa Becic’s office announced that the BOK warned of the real possibility that dozens of members of high-risk organized crime groups could leave UIKS by the end of the year due to the inefficiencies of court proceedings and the failure to deliver judgments within the legally defined deadline.

“Which is why the Bureau once again affirms the need to adopt urgent amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code, especially in the part of extending the duration of custody to five years for the most serious crimes and preventing procedural abuses”, the press release says.

It is assessed that it is necessary to amend the Criminal Code as soon as possible by introducing the violation of surveillance measures as a separate criminal offense and to adopt the innovative Law on Confiscation of Criminal Assets, as one of the key mechanisms in the fight against criminal structures.

The BOK also registered intensive trend of hybrid activity, in response to the never stronger and more intense fight against serious organized crime. 

It was assessed that the latest activities of the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption is not in line with the legal system of Montenegro, nor in the spirit of decriminalization, reconciliation, protection of integrity and efficiency of the security sector, as well as establishment of the rule of law principle.