Serbia’s PM shrugs off weapons find, says ‘nobody touched me’

Serbia’s Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic said yesterday he did not believe he had been subject to an assassination attempt, seeking to calm tensions after the discovery of a cache of heavy weapons on a route regularly taken by his motorcade. The weapons, which included a rocket launcher, hand grenades and rifle ammunition, were found in bushes in the neighbourhood of Jajinci, near a crossroads where Vucic’s motorcade normally slows on his frequent visits to his parents’ home.

“Someone could have simply dumped weapons there by chance,” he told reporters at a press briefing held to discuss a visit by an International Monetary Fund mission. “This was not an assassination attempt,” he said. “Nobody touched me.” Vucic said a tipoff led to the discovery of the weapons and that he was immediately taken to an undisclosed safe place. No arrests have been made in connection with the find.

He appeared to have no extra security at yesterday’s news conference, which had been scheduled long in advance and was held in the usual central government building. Nevertheless, police were out in greater force than normal in Belgrade, patrolling in streets around government buildings. —Reuters