Award-winning Montenegrin reporter sentenced on drug charges

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A court in Montenegro on Thursday sentenced an award-winning investigative journalist to one year in jail following a retrial on drug trafficking charges.

Jovo Martinovic, who has reported widely on organised crime and war crimes for both local and foreign outlets, was sentenced in 2019 to a year and a half in prison over alleged links to a smuggling ring.

Martinovic, who has denied the accusations, appealed the verdict, and an appeals tribunal ordered the retrial citing lack of evidence.

At the time media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) slammed the ruling as a "disturbing setback for press freedom" in Montenegro.

Also, Brussels warned the Balkan nation that restricting the press could imperil its bid to join the European Union.

The journalist said earlier that his contacts with criminal circles were strictly professional in the context of reporting.

On Thursday, Martinovic, 48, labelled his new verdict "political and shameful" and said he would appeal it.

"Witnesses' testimonies were in my favour. All the evidence was in my favour. The court did not want to accept the evidence I proposed which shows that I was on a reporting mission.

"The judgement was written a long time ago," he told reporters.

However, Martinovic will not go to jail as he was already detained for nearly 15 months -- longer than his sentence -- while awaiting the first trial.

Martinovic has worked for major international media including the BBC and the Financial Times.

He won the 2018 Peter Mackler Award for his investigations, including work that exposed war crimes during and after Serbia's conflict with Kosovo in the 1990s.

On Tuesday, RSF and seven other media freedom groups had urged Martinovic's acquittal.

A new conviction would "undermine media freedom" in Montenegro and be incompatible with its EU accession, for which an "independent and pluralist media is a key condition", they said in a statement.

Montenegro, home to 650,000 people, hopes to join the EU by 2025 and is under growing pressure to tackle organised crime and safeguard media freedom.

Before Martinovic's arrest he had worked on stories about the notorious "Pink Panther" international jewel thieves gang made up of members mainly from the former Yugoslavia.

Gang member Dusko Martinovic was sentenced to six years and three months in the trial. Six others were also convicted.