Goran Arsenijevic held at Batrovci border entering Serbia
The founder of Cacak's citizens' group Znanjem za Cacak says he waited at the border from 6:30 p.m. until after midnight and suspects he is on a BIA blacklist.
Goran Arsenijevic, founder of the Cacak citizens’ group “Znanjem za Cacak” (Knowledge for Cacak), says border officers held him at Batrovci as he entered Serbia at about 6:30 p.m. on October 19, and that he only continued his journey in the early hours of October 20. He told the Beta news agency he suspects the cause is the criticism his group directs at the city authorities in Cacak.
Arsenijevic, who is also a member of the City Election Commission in Cacak for the Student List, says he holds a Slovenian passport as well as a Serbian one and has crossed the border without any problems for the past 15 years. The group was formed a year and a half ago.
How did the check at Batrovci unfold?
By his account, the trouble began as soon as his passport was scanned. Arsenijevic says he noticed the officer’s reaction right away:
“When I handed over my passport at the border crossing, I saw the officer’s reaction as it was being scanned and sensed what was coming. He called a colleague and they sent me to a detailed check,” Arsenijevic told Beta.
He was taken to a separate room and his vehicle was searched thoroughly. When nothing was found, he was told the car had to go through a scanner. After a long wait he was told the scanner was not working and that he had to sit in his car, while officers stood around him and guarded him.
In the meantime he called his lawyers. Their advice, as he relayed it, was to demand the legal basis for his detention in writing:
“In the meantime I called my lawyers, who advised me to demand in writing the grounds on which they were holding me and why they had taken my documents,” Arsenijevic said.
At about 11:30 p.m., a border officer told him they had the right to hold him indefinitely, until the scanner was repaired.
When was he released, and what went unrecorded?
The times of his release do not line up even in Beta’s own report. Its opening paragraph says he was let go an hour after midnight, while Arsenijevic’s statement puts it at half past midnight. Beta’s headline speaks of seven hours, but 6:30 p.m. to half past midnight comes to a little over six, so the exact length of the detention is only his estimate.
“Around half past midnight, one officer finally appeared, said I could continue my journey and let me go at my own responsibility,” Arsenijevic said.
The customs officer who was supposed to issue him an official note did not do so in the end. According to Arsenijevic, the reason was that neither the scanner nor the printer was working.
What does Arsenijevic suspect?
After speaking with his lawyers, Arsenijevic concludes that the detention was unjustified. He suspects he is on a “blacklist” of the Security Information Agency (BIA), because the group he leads analyzes and criticizes the work of the current city authorities in Cacak. That is his assumption, not a confirmed fact.
The reports we reviewed contain no response from the border police or the BIA to these claims, so their side of the story is not yet known.
