New Killing in Troubled Kotor Rattles Montenegro

After five unsolved murders in the last two months, some of them in the coastal town of Kotor or carried out by Kotor crime groups, the government and the security agencies have been accused of not doing enough to protect citizens against criminals who are "more powerful than the state".

After another killing in Kotor on Saturday, opposition parties and NGOs on Monday called for firm action by the security agencies to "protect innocent lives" in the apparent crime war raging in the coastal town.

The opposition slated what it called the police's and prosecution's inadequate response in Kotor, alleging that criminal groups have their own people within the security institutions.

The opposition URA movement said the situation clearly was deteriorating and that it was only matter of time before more innocent people were injured or killed.

"On behalf of the citizens of Kotor, we demand a peace and security that has been taken away for us for years by some structures in the state which, by their inaction, have created a system that suits the criminals and where human life is worth nothing," it said.

The latest murder shook Kotor on Saturday, when a former football player, Goran Lenc, was assassinated, just hours after Prime Minister Dusko Markovic and security agencies chiefs met to talk about the security situation in the country.

The meeting was called as a response to another Kotor-gang-related murder in the capital, Podgorica, last week, when two men were killed in the crowded centre of the city in daylight - one of which was reportedly a bystander.

Markovic said that while the "peace and security [situation] are favourable" in Kotor, he acknowledged concerns about the activities of organized criminal...