Dacic: Pristina trying to dodge responsibility for killing of Serbian policeman

BELGRADE - Serbian Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said on Monday Pristina was trying to dodge the responsibility for last week's killing of a Serbian policeman in Loznica, western Serbia, after failing to issue an arrest warrant for the killer, who had escaped from a prison in Kosovo-Metohija.

Speaking to Pink TV, Dacic said the killing of police officer Nikola Krsmanovic was a premeditated murder in which several different "centres of power" had been involved but that Pristina was trying to associate the murder with crime, rather than terrorism.

"They are now trying to get out of this situation. He escaped from prison and no arrest warrant was ever issued for him. That raises the question of how that is possible and how he was over here in Presevo and Bujanovac after only a few days without having legally crossed the administrative line (between central Serbia and Kosovo-Metohija)," Dacic said.

He announced that Serbian authorities would investigate all circumstances of the case and the movements of the killer - ethnic Albanian Faton Hajrizi - as well as find out how he had obtained personal documents that had not been his own.

He said answers to come from Germany and Slovenia would be important for the investigation.