A denier in denial

Prosecutors say that they will begin to investigate the charges that Vladimir Popović, leading one to wonder what they have been doing so far. Meanwhile, another unpersuasive denial has been made, this one by the former head of military security, Aco Tomić. (Note: These quotations are from the same article , though B92 cites Novosti, which is in the habit of posting articles in illegible format).

Aco Tomić's statements are like a blast from the not so distant past. He accuses Mr Popović of making accusations that are "untrue and part of a foreign scenario," and goes on to enhance his credibility by calling the accusations "a new Račak and Markale," which brings back an old official line that those massacres were the product of clever stage directors rather than the people who committed them.


Aco Tomić

Then come Mr Tomić's strongest arguments. He says, "I affirm that the military had nothing to do with the murder. Also that nobody in the government talked about plans to murder Đinđić because if they had, we would have known about it." And he invents two new national institutions, saying that Popović "directs his charges at everything that is national, from the Army and Church to the Academy, to prime minister Koštunica and his party."

Perhaps partly as a result of this ongoing scandal, the most recent public opinion survey shows Koštunica's DSS continuing to lose popularity, now rating a fourth place with 10.7% support. However, DS is not the beneficiary. They remain on top, barely, ahead of the Radicals by less than 1%. meanwhile, "Snaga Srbije," the populist paraparty led by dubious rich guy Bogoljub Karić, is rated third at 11.7%. I think this result says very little about the appeal of SRS and "Snaga Srbije," and very much about the declining legitimacy of institutions. One is reminded of Hannah Arendt's description of a previous intellectual elite that came to believe that "history, which was a forgery anyway, might as well be the playground of crackpots."