Serbia was under a state of emergency last night after the assassination of its reformist prime minister Zoran Djindjic plunged the Balkans into renewed crisis.
A government statement blamed his murder on organised criminals trying to to avert a clampdown on their activities and throw the country into disorder.
As the Serbian news agency quoted officials as saying that three people had been arrested, rumours swept the capital that one of those detained was a former commander of a police special operations unit.
The BBC reported the govenment as naming Milorad Lukovic, who commanded Slobodan Milosevic’s Red Beret interior ministry troops but later sided with Djindjic, as being among the suspects.
The government, meeting in permanent session through the evening, issued a stream of edicts which gave the army a role alongside the police in restoring internal security and set up a new body of politicians, army and police chiefs to manage the crisis.
It blamed the Zemun clan, called after a district of Belgrade, which it said was responsible for numerous crimes, including murders and kidnappings, adding that Djindjic’s murder ”represents an attempt by this criminal clan to cause chaos, lawlessness and fear in the country”.
Djindjic’s deputy, Nebojsa Covic, was appointed acting prime minister.
Belgrade airport was closed to outgoing flights.
Djindjic was shot in broad daylight in the centre of Belgrade, two years after he embarked on the formidable task of remodelling a country which became a pariah under Milosevic.
Grieving Serbs, sunk in despair at the prospect of more upheaval and violence, turned the cabinet office into a shrine last night, lighting candles and laying wreaths of daffodils at the spot where Djindjic fell.
While messages of condolence and warnings about the persistent dangers of political violence and extremism in Serbia poured in from abroad, the armed forces were mobilised and railway stations, bus services and airports were closed to help the hunt for the murderers.
Government officials said Djindjic was killed by two large-calibre sniper bullets, one in the stomach and one in the back, as he was leaving his car to enter the cabinet office in the city centre at lunchtime.
On crutches after a recent football injury, he slumped against his armour-plated car before being taken to hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
He was on his way to meet the Swedish foreign minister, Anna Lind.
By coincidence the Swedish prime minister Olaf Palme was the last European head of government assassinated, 17 years ago.
The murder stunned the Balkans, including Serbia’s enemies in the vicious wars of the 1990s, and sent a wave of apprehension through the western diplomatic community, which is preoccupied with the crisis in Iraq.
Stipe Mesic, president of Croatia, which was at war with Serbia in 1991-95, called it an act of madness which could destabilise the region.
Lord Robertson, the Nato secretary general, and Joschka Fischer, the German foreign minister, echoed the view that it was an act of political extremism aimed at returning Serbia to the chaos and lawlessness under Milosevic, who is on trial in the Hague for genocide and war crimes.
He had powerful enemies in the Milosevic and the Kostunica camps, and among the Kosovan Albanians, because because of his calls for an ethnic partition of the province
But last night suspicion focused primarly on the powerful underworld chiefs who helped Djindjic to overthrow Milosevic but now fear for their survival because of the government’s crackdown on organised crime.
”I am afraid for the future of Serbia,” said Slobodan Vucetic, the head of the supreme court.
Kostunica called the murder ”awful” and said it showed how thoroughly criminalised Serbia had become.
Only a fortnight ago, also in broad daylight, Djindjic narrowly survived an attempt on his life in a car crash on a motorway outside Belgrade.
A well-known Belgrade gangster who swerved a lorry into the path of the prime minister’s vehicle was arrested then released by magistrates.
Djindjic, who was married and had two children, said himself that mafia bosses had tried to have him killed. – Guardian Unlimited Â