Head of the Serbian government’s Office of Media Relations Srdjan Djuric has denied allegations by Belgrade’s weekly Evropa that the government is negotiating with General Ratko Mladic on his surrender to the Hague tribunal.
He pointed out that the news article published by Evropa is incorrect from the first to the last word and he added that nobody from the magazine had contacted anyone at the government before running the story, because this information would have been denied immediately.
Djuric said that the issue of cooperation with the Hague tribunal is of too great an importance for Serbia to be an object of sensationalist speculation and he called on domestic media, given the significance of this subject, to publish verified facts only and to report in an objective manner.
He said that any form of disinformation like this causes great damage and does not contribute towards Serbia’s further successful cooperation with the Hague tribunal.