The Basic Public Prosecutor’s Office in Aleksinac will have to continue the proceedings based on the criminal complaint filed by the former Minister of Mining and Energy, Zorana Mihajlović, against 14 persons who were responsible for the safety of workers in the Soko mine when eight miners died on April 1 last year.

The higher public prosecutor’s office in Niš accepted the objection of the lawyer representing the families of the injured Bratisalvo Stojanović and ordered the Aleksinac prosecutor’s office to continue with the proceedings.

“We are satisfied with how the competent authorities are now conducting the proceedings. Let’s expect that in the basic proceedings, the republican inspector for mining, who supervised the Soko mine after the disaster, will also be heard. The dispatcher who worked critical nights in the mine and several other persons will also be heard.” , Stojanović told Euronews Serbia.

We encourage you, the Prosecutor’s Office in Aleksinac twice previously decided that no one was to blame for the accident in the mine, so then the lawyer and the families of the injured miners announced criminal charges and stated that, if justice is not served in Serbia, they will seek it before an international court.

At that time, lawyer Stojanović said that he submitted a complaint to the Higher Public Prosecutor’s Office in Niš. As he stated at the time, they received an expert report from the Republic’s mining inspector only in December, where, as he stated, it was determined that there were irregularities and omissions, that work was done without permits, and that this now provides new arguments for further action in this case.

“I just want to point out that we have come to incredible information, that the republican mining inspector, during the inspection after the mining accident, determined that the works were carried out outside the work permit. The reported works were 14 months before the mining accident occurred. So, 14 months “Soko” mine carried out pit excavations without a work permit,” said lawyer Bratislav Stojanović at the time.

Let us remind you that in the early morning hours of April 1, 2022, an accident occurred in the mine. Zorana Mihajlović, then Minister of Mining and Energy, told reporters at the time that there was no explosion, but that the miners suffocated due to the high concentration of methane. The Acting Director of Resavica, Saša Spasić, said at the time that there was most likely a methane breakthrough and that its concentration was 95 percent.