Agency director Dalibor Kitanović deletes post about Ratko Mladić and apologises to the prime minister

The director of the Agency for Realisation of the Rights of Communities, Dalibor Kitanović, deleted a social-media post showing Ratko Mladić alongside Serbian historical figures and apologised to Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski and to ministers he said were drawn into a political dispute. The post, which Kitanović removed, had carried the caption "Generals of the heavenly army."

Director says he is ready to take responsibility but accuses opponents of a political campaign

Kitanović announced the deletion after three days of silence and wrote that he is prepared to accept responsibility for his words but rejected what he described as manipulations of his statements. He said he would not allow his retraction to be turned into an admission of something he had not done and warned that his decency should not be interpreted as weakness.

In his message Kitanović wrote that he will not allow anyone to insult "neither my people nor my party" through him. He also insisted that part of his closest family in Bosnia and Herzegovina survived wartime conditions thanks to regular military units led by General Ratko Mladić, a claim he used to explain why the image had appeared on his account.

The post triggered strong reactions across the political scene and beyond. Critics accused Kitanović and DPS, which publicly backed him, of glorifying a convicted war criminal and said the government had not responded adequately to what they called a scandalous publication. Kitanović, for his part, said he was the target of a political lynching and a campaign against him.

The publication of the image followed the death of Ratko Mladić in The Hague, where he had been serving a life sentence for genocide and war crimes. Amid the controversy, media reports suggested Kitanović could lose his government position as director of the agency.

Photo: press material from the event