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While Montenegro continues to flip-flop on where — or even if — to extradite Do Kwon, it appears that the crypto scammer is managing to single-handedly rip the Balkan nation apart.
Most recently, the former minister of justice, Andrej Milovic, accused current prime minister, Milojko Spajić, of purposely attempting to have Do extradited to South Korea instead of the United States for his own selfish reasons.
Milovic said, “Prime minister Milojko Spajić and his close friend lawyer Goran Rodić, Do Kwon’s defender, are trying in every way to prevent Do Kwon’s extradition to the USA, in order not to stop the complete investigation by the US judicial authorities and examine the business relationship between Do Kwon and Spajić, which they had before the indisputably mounted the pre-election scandal surrounding the arrival of Do Kwon in Montenegro and the connection with the financing of PES (the political party of Spajić).”
He also claimed that he lost his role specifically because he intended to have Do extradited to the US, saying, “Spajić could not come to terms with the fact that with my legal knowledge… I prevented the illegal and rigged extradition to South Korea, about which we had a private discussion, which was ultimately one of the reasons for my dismissal.”
The picture painted by Milovic suggests a country rife with corruption and conspiracies even at the highest levels of public office. Spajić has already admitted to meeting with Do before the latter’s arrival in Montenegro and to purchasing 750,000 LUNA tokens in 2018 (though he had previously stated that the purchase was for his employer — a claim which proved to be untrue).
Also, the lawyer representing Do, Goran Rodic, has filed claims worth over $500,000 against Terraform Labs. The claim is an invoice for legal representation in extradition proceedings for Do and seems to suggest that he hasn’t been, nor does he expect to be, paid for his service.
Read more: The high-profile LUNA investors — from prime ministers to beauty queens
Office of the PM fires back
Speaking to Montenegrin-media outlet Vijesti, the PM’s office said that all of Milovic’s claims were false and that Spajić had dismissed the justice minister because he “wanted to cover up the non-extradition of the leader of the Turkish branch of the Kavak clan, Binali Čamgoz, to his home country with false affairs that he suddenly remembered after his justifiable dismissal.”
Čamgoz is accused of a double murder and, like Do Kwon, was caught in Montenegro with a fake passport. While Do has had his extradition tussled over by two competing nations, Čamgoz hasn’t been sent back to Turkey apparently due to his Kurdish ancestry and the fact he could be unduly persecuted.
While deflecting the claims made by Milovic, the PM’s office instead said the accusations were “fabricated affairs and conspiracy theories that serve to cover a Maradona-style bravado,” and an attempt to position Milovic to win the mayoral race in Podgorica.
This led to Milovic to respond in kind, saying that he “received congratulations from the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe and ministers from the EU” for his judgment not to send Čamgoz back to Turkey.
Read more: Do Kwon appeal claims lawyers had 20 mins to review docs before hearing
Do threatens Montenegro’s rise to the EU
For years, Montenegro has been negotiating to attain EU membership and recently, it’s been said by the German Chancellor that such an ascendency could be as little as four years away. But, with realistic claims of corruption from the former minister of justice, it seems dubious that it could occur that quickly.
However, it’s also worth pointing out that it’s not clear why the US would stop investigating co-conspirators and political corruption claims just due to Do being extradited to South Korea, nor why Montenegro wouldn’t do a wide-scale investigation of its own.
Regardless, the situation continues to unravel and appear worse and worse for PM Spajić, who is fighting for his political life.