Former director of Montenegro’s National Security Agency (ANB), Dejan Peruničić, has been sentenced to five years in prison for ordering the illegal wiretapping and surveillance of former opposition leaders, journalists, and religious figures between late 2019 and the August 30, 2020 elections.
Former intelligence officer Srđan Pavićević was sentenced to one year and four months, according to RTCG.
Peruničić was tried on three indictments filed by the Special State Prosecutor’s Office, which accused him of abuse of office.
He and Pavićević were suspected of illegally monitoring members of the Democratic Front, former Special State Prosecutor Milivoje Katnić, and several other individuals.
The indictment states that between December 2019 and August 2020 in Podgorica, Peruničić abused his official position as ANB director by issuing oral orders to unidentified agency officers to conduct electronic communications surveillance on phone numbers belonging to 50 individuals, a political party, several companies, and a religious community, without approval from the President of the Supreme Court or an authorized judge. These actions, prosecutors said, seriously violated their right to privacy and family life as guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights and the Constitution of Montenegro.
Peruničić was arrested in 2021 and dismissed from his post as agency chief in mid-December 2020.
