Even by the standards of Balkan intrigue, the conspiracy that Mirko Velimirovic revealed to Montenegrin police days before the country’s parliamentary elections seemed dangerous.

Soon after walking off the street and demanding to speak to the police chief, the former policeman began to outline a plot that, if true, risked sending Montenegro into chaos months before it was due to join Nato.

The 45-year-old told officials he had been hired to buy weapons and rent a hideout for a gang of Serbian nationalists who were to launch a bloody attack on the Parliament.

The resulting massacre by the gang, who boasted of powerful backing from abroad, could tip the country into bloody civil war and derail any hopes of the country entering the Western fold.