This team started work last year in June, within the Institute for Liberal Studies in Belgrade and with almost the same members. Our sources from the Federal administration and non-governmental organizations, which insisted on anonymity, claim that this team of legal experts was organized within the Center for Human Rights based on the proposal of the Federation President and the deputy president of the People's Party, an economist by training, was included after an intervention by Kostunica. According to these sources, the project is led by Aleksandar Nikitovic, who is in charge of work with pro-Serb parties in Montenegro in Kostunica's cabinet. The task of the expert team, according to our sources, it to finish proposals for revision of the Federal and Serbian constitutions and the legal framework for the establishment of new relations between Montenegro and Serbia by the June of this year and deliver them to the president of FRY and Serbian leadership.
To our question whether he would today travel to Belgrade to the meeting of the team of legal experts dealing with the revision of the federal and Serbian constitutions and future relations between Montenegro and Serbia, Predrag Popovic replied that he had "never heard of that team before". Dr. Vojin Dimitrijevic, the director of the Belgrade Center for Human Rights confirmed that "a very private meeting" of legal experts would be held today in "Palas". He emphasized that "the project has nothing to do with the new authorities in Serbia and FRY".
"Our project is not supported by the state institutions and hasn't been presented to the politicians so far. Also, it has nothing to do with party affiliation, so that besides Predrag Popovic, we have also invited Dr. Mijat Sukovic, Prof. Blagota Mitric, and the adviser of the Montenegrin president Miodrag Vukovic, all from Montenegro," explained Dimitrijevic.
Prof. Dr. Mijat Sukovic confirmed that he had been invited to the today's meeting but he said that he would not attend it.
"I know that almost an identical team worked last year on these issues, but the documents offered now are different in content. I do not think that the text of two proposals prepared by the team, confederal and federal, was prepared on the basis of analysis of the current situation in Montenegro and Serbia, but is instead based on theoretical approach, simply as an attempt to solve certain things. Both offered proposals are identical in many important aspects," said Sukovic.
He added that it seems to him that the approach of colleagues from Belgrade is somewhat patronizing with respect to the people invited from Montenegro, and that one gets the impression that they were invited for the sole purpose of legitimizing something that has already been completed.
"I disagree with that approach according to which we would give our opinion, and they take what they like and conclude that experts from Montenegro participated in the preparation of the document. I also dislike the approach according to which a non-governmental organization, on its own initiative, as they explained, prepares documents about the future of the state," explained Sukovic.
Miodrag Vukovic also confirmed that he would not participate in the discussions prepared by legal experts gathered in the Center for Human Rights.
"In an open discussion with the most distinguished experts for constitutional and international law from Serbia, regarding the offered documents, we discussed the issue of the existing and future relations between Serbia and Montenegro, especially those dealing with disappearance and creation of states, federalism, confederalism, sovereignty, international legal subjectivity, and right to self-determination. We represented in the discussion to our public well known views that have to do with the essential, existential interests of the majority in Montenegro in accordance with scientific principles of legal and political sciences, in our clear conscience, and the best we could.
"Because of that we reject with indignation any possibility and even a thought that by participating in such an expert discussion, similar to others that are frequently organized these days, we have given legitimacy to anything and anyone, least of all to 'the changes of the non-existent constitution of a non-existent state'," emphasize Vucinic, Susic and Blazic.