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Kosovo police special forces. Photo: EPA-EFE/VALDRIN XHEMAJ.

Kosovo police sources told BIRN on Friday that Milan Radoicic, a leading figure in northern Kosovo who is close to Serbia’s ruling Progressive Party, is a suspect in the murder of politician Oliver Ivanovic.

Police have only said officially so far that a male with the initials M.R., born in 1978, is a suspect in the case, and that his home has been raided. The Kosovo prosecution has also said that a male with the initials M.R. is a suspect.

Weapons and military material that Kosovo Police seized during the raids. Photo: Kosovo Police

Ivanovic, who was shot in front of his party headquarters in Mitrovica on January 16, named Radoicic as a key figure in what he alleged was an intimidatory system of power in northern Kosovo. Radoicic has not commented on the allegation.

Weapons and military material that Kosovo Police seized during the raids. Photo: Kosovo Police

In June, Radoicic was named vice-president of Srpska Lista, the main Kosovo Serb party, which is backed by Belgrade.

BIRN tried to reach Radoicic on a number he answered two days ago, but a male who answered said it was a “wrong number”.

Weapons and military material that Kosovo Police seized during the raids. Photo: Kosovo Police

Kosovo police special forces on Friday morning arrested three people allegedly connected to the murder of Kosovo Serb politician Oliver Ivanovic, and another person for obstructing police officers.

The Kosovo prosecution said police also raided the home of Radoicic, but he avoided arrest.

The Mitrovica municipality posted a video of the police operation on its Facebook page, describing it as a “demonstration of force” and the “intimidation of Serbs”.

The leadership of the four mostly-Serb municipalities in north Kosovo has asked for the immediate release of the arrested Serbs, and for increases in tariffs on Serbian imports which were imposed this week by the Pristina government to be revoked.

The main Kosovo Serb party, Srpska lista, said that a peaceful protest will be held in Rudare, while the Serb leadership of the Zubin Potok municipality has decided to close all shops and to block the Brnjak crossing between Serbia and Kosovo, as well as the highway in the village of Zupce, RTS reported.

Protest in Rudare. Photo: BIRN/Behar Mustafa

Meanwhile, Belgrade media reported on Thursday that the Pristina prosecution asked the Serbian Interior Ministry to take a statement from the Serbian opposition politician Sasa Jankovic about the Ivanovic murder case.

Jankovic, Serbia’s former Ombudsman who is now a politician, said that the information appeared in the Serbian press just hours after he gave a statement as a witness, saying that the media “drew a target” on him.

Ivanovic was seen as a political moderate who advocated coexistence between Kosovo’s Serb minority and ethnic Albanian majority.

However, at the time of his death he was being retried for ordering the murder of Kosovo Albanians in 1999 during the war in 1999. He pleaded not guilty.

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