Stanko Subotić

Subotić came from a working-class family, to which he was born as the sixth and youngest child. During early childhood, he started working in his father's carpentry shop. A Serbian national by birth, since 1999 he completed the streamlined High School of Economics in Ub, where he met his future wife Jagoda.[3]

Subotić started business in 1981 when he left for France visiting his school mate whose parents had left him in Paris small first-class couture manufacture. He started to work in his friend's firm and two years later he opened a chain of clothing boutiques and developed his own wholesale.

During the mid-1980s Subotić started to invest into Serbian economy and in 1989 he came back in Yugoslavia at the time of the reforms designed by Ante Marković. In 1991, he founded a company named MIA in Belgrade with chain of boutiques and two plants for ready-made clothing manufacture.[4]

Due to impede business circumstances in 1992 the company Ohis from Skopje on behalf of debt to Subotić gave him instead of money payment a contingent of cigarettes from the assortment of the Company Makedonija tabak, and later he started his cigarette trading business in 1995. At the time Subotić owned two duty-free shops at the Đeneral Janković border crossing near Makedonija and in sea port Bar in Montenegro. In 1996 Subotić became exclusive distributor for SE Europe of foreign cigarettes producers British American Tobacco and Japan Tobacco, and in 1997 he contracted general representation for the same territory with the French factories SEITA and Reynolds, the manufacturer of the cigarettes brand Monte Carlo.

By 1995, he entered the cigarette trade in Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, a country under a UN imposed trade embargo. Subotić owned two duty-free shops at the Đeneral Janković border crossing and in 1996 became exclusive distributor of foreign cigarette producers such as Philip Morris and British American Tobacco. His cigarette trading business was initially based in Serbia, but, in 1997, after Vlada "Tref" Kovačević and Radovan "Badža" Stojičić were murdered, Subotić relocated his entire business to Montenegro and moved there, where he established high political and business connections with the republic's Prime Minister Milo Đukanović and ruling DPS party president Svetozar Marović.[5]

After Subotić experienced disfavour by the regime of Slobodan Milošević followed by his refusal to pay requested racket and in July 1997 the police intruded his duty-free shop at the Đeneral Janković border crossing and his firm Mia was shut down after police torture and confiscation of the entire business documentation. Due to often attacks by the political structures at the time and attempt of illegal seizure of his property, Subotić left Serbia in 1997 together with his family and went to Geneva where he got permanent residence in 1999.[6]

Subotić continued development of his business during the change of the business condition in Serbia. In 2002 he founded EMI Group (Emerging Marketing Investments APS), a holding company with head office in Copenhagen, Denmark connecting business of several successful companies in Europe covering distribution, trade and real estate. In the same year EMI invested into the plant for meat products processing and he became co-owner of the factory Famis d.o.o. in Serbia. Next year the holding bought the company Duvanpromet from Kragujevac that used to be the owner of the large distribution network in Serbia including kiosks and newspaper stands and retail goods. Investing several tenth million euros into ruined Duvanpromet Subotić established the company Futura plus.

After acquiring Duvan, in 2004, Subotić began collaborating with the German media holding group Wastdeutsche Allgemaine Zeitung (WAZ), which, by purchase of the larger part of shares in Politika, got into ownership own distribution network enabling significant expansion of the Futura plus sales capacity. Merging kiosk chains of Duvan, Politika sales, Borba and Duvanpromet into the ownership of the EMI Group on one side, and German WAZ on the other side, the Futura plus became the largest distribution network in Serbia. Subotić later founded a company in Montenegro named Montenegro Futura using the same distribution scheme.

In addition to the investments in Serbia, Subotić in 2007 became sole owner of the French holding and wine cellar Louis Max where he began investing in 1989, and after 2003 he bought hundreds of acres of wine yards on Burgundy (France). As in everything else he took hold of Subotić glistened in the vine production. The Luis Max bottles of vine have been served even in the White House.[7][8]

The EMI Group has in its ownership the land near the Belgrade airport Nikola Tesla deemed very strategic importance, and the land near the peninsula Sveti Stefan where Subotić has his luxury hotel Villa Montenegro that was awarded by the end of March 2007 the Five Stars Diamond prize for the quality service by the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences.

During the spring 2007 Subotić additionally extended his activities by large investments in Montenegro: buying part of the island Sveti Nikola near Budva, and announcing plans for construction of luxury hotel worth of EUR 20 million on the peninsula Sveti Stefan. In May 2007 Subotić and famous French architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte, who designed marinas in Canes, Nice and Shanghai, have presented construction plans for the resort on the island Sveti Nikola with hotels, casinos and apartments, two marina for yachts and pedestrian lane connecting the island with the old town in Budva. Although all assumptions for that large project realization were provided, including corresponding credit lines worth of several hundreds of million euros, its realization was ceased by politically motivated wanted circular from Serbia that was followed as consequence of indictment that will be fully rejected in December 2015 by decision of the Court of Appellation in Belgrade.

Subotić owns a luxury hotel Villa Montenegro on Sveti Stefan island.[9] In March 2007, this hotel was awarded the "Five Stars Diamond" award for the quality of service by the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences.[10]

Since mid-1990s Subotić established close relation with the former Serbian opposition and leader of the Democratic Party Zoran Đinđić and he actively supported democratic changes in the country. After Slobodan Milošević regime fall, Subotić supported, by his numerous contacts, promotion of pro-European politics and new image of Serbia enabling meetings to the Đinđić government members with worlds` high officials including former French president Jacques Chirac.

In May 2001, Croatia's Nacional weekly published detailed accounts of Subotić's activities, claiming he had been involved together with Montenegro president Milo Đukanović and leading opposition leader in Serbia Zoran Đinđić during the second half of the 1990s in alleged smuggling business with cigarettes. He responded that the news stories were fabrications paid for and planted by a competing Croatian tobacco producer, Tvornica duhana Rovinj, supposedly threatened by Subotić's plans to jointly build a tobacco factory in Serbia with British American Tobacco in 2001.[11] News reporters from Nacional later acknowledged that the Affair had been ordered and conducted from Belgrade including large number of the court verdicts against this weekly magazine due to fabrications written about Subotić.[12][13]

After October 2000 changes in Serbia and the first democratic government formation in Belgrade, the PM Zoran Đinđić was faced with empty budget and the most important problem for the state cashier was tobacco smuggling business. Searching possible solution for the problem, Subotić represented to the PM at the time an example from Romania where gray market of cigarettes was stamped out due to cooperation with the BAT Company. Subotić became a target of attacks by the competition factory Rovinj from Pula that controlled at the time the largest part of the tobacco black market in the Region. Opposed interests within the tobacco industry and political clashes impacted Serbia at the time have created circumstances where Subotić was selected as the main target for the attack to Zoran Đinđić, but also as convenient object for racketing and blackmailing by the alien state structures and out of institutional power centers. Subotić has been targeted due to huge property he owes in Serbia intended to be confiscated by the protagonists of false accusations.

Series of lawsuits followed after the writings in Nacional established that Tobacco Affair creation had been ordered from Belgrade and delivered by Ratko Knežević, rejected ex-associate of Milo Đukanović, and Jasna Babić, the author of texts, has admitted later that he had meeting in Belgrade with president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia at the time Vojislav Koštunica who had promised to her evidence for the Tobacco Affair, but he had never submitted to her any of such evidence. After series of lost lawsuits the Nacional apologised to Subotić in 2013 for fabricated news stories about him attributing all to the former owner and editor of that magazine controversial reporter Ivo Pukanić.

After launching Tobacco Affair it was written over 4.000 negative texts in period of ten years and in various media, all about Subotić that has been established as false, all of them with no exception due to results of official investigations in six European countries and USA, as well as during the trials in Serbia.[14]

In the lawsuits, the team of attorneys has filed on behalf of Subotić in 2010 in Geneva and 2012 in Belgrade, it was described the mechanism of false texts placing about him. Media campaigns had been initiated by the highly positioned people from the ex-president of SRY Vojislav Koštunica and later the president of Serbia Boris Tadić. Hiding behind official state bodies they used to submit false reports initiating official investigations in six European countries (Lichtenstein, France, Switzerland, Cyprus, Italy, and Greece) and USA that all with no exception resulted in rejection of the stated doubts.[15] The culmination of the pursuit was lawsuit filing before the Special Court in Belgrade by which Subotić was accused for non-existing act of office abuse in the private company. In spite of unseen media pursuit and approved numerous misuse on the side of prosecution and hard pressure on the judicature, hat lawsuit was rejected by decision of the Court of Appellation in Belgrade in December 2015.[16][17]

Simultaneously with trials in Serbia since 2008 and after power establishment of Democratic Party and the president Boris Tadić at the time, Subotić has been exposed to new wave of media campaign followed by statements of state officials sentencing him in advance as convict.[18] In that period in Serbia the pressure on his business in the country was increased and in 2009 his company Futura Plus, one of the largest distributors, went in bankruptcy.[19] That bankruptcy was an attempt to confiscate the land from Subotić near the airport in Belgrade that was registered as mortgage security for loans the Futura used to take. Subotić discovered that this attack had been organized by local tycoons Miroslav Mišković and Milan Beko he formerly had business relations and who owed him more than 30 million euros. That debt originated from privatization of the newspaper Večernje Novosti during which process Beko refused to fulfill contractual obligation and to transfer shares of Novosti to German WAZ, so WAZ activated the bank warranty Subotić gave as the job warranty.[20] Subotić's doubts were confirmed and the governmental Council for Fight Against Corruption released back-stage actions by Milan Beko in its Report on privatization of Večernje Novosti.[21] Due to pressure of the authorities at the time and prevention of normal business the German company WAZ decided to leave Serbia and to sell its shares in Politika and Dnevnik.[22][23]

In the media campaign that was initiated by the ex-president Boris Tadić cabinet the leading role had newspapers Blic and Večernje Novosti including opposition media in Montenegro attacking Subotić due to his friendship with leader of the ruling party DPS Milo Đukanović. Attempting to sentence Subotić at any price, the Special Prosecutor for Organized Crime initiated investigations against him in six European countries and USA. All investigations that were launched by reports from Belgrade were concluded with decisions stating the false reports for acts that had never happened.[24]

The most important such investigations were in Switzerland and Italy. In December 2011 the Switzerland Confederation Prosecutor issued official confirmation to Subotić stating that investigation that had been conducted by the Switzerland court police for one and half of year on the basis of the false report from Belgrade, had showed no violation in the business conduct by Subotić. That case was titled as Affair Ticino due to place of meeting where special prosecutor Miljko Radisavljević and his deputy Saša Ivanić falsely reported Subotić to Switzerland officials.[25]

Upon the report from Serbia in Italy was launched the court proceeding that ended when the prosecutor, after he had established the false statements by the Serbian officials, requested to pronounce as non-existing acts Subotić had been put on trial regarding evidence clearly showing that acts never happened. This verdict represents unique precedent in practice of Italian judicature and it is deemed as the highest possible grade of freeing against stated doubts.[26] Investigations in Lichtenstein, France, Belgium, Greece and USA confirmed that Subotić had been reported for acts that had never happened or he had not been connected with.

During media and legal campaigns conducted against him in Serbia, Stanko Subotić became the first victim of fake news and manipulations by media. Until 2012 the campaign against him was led under the control of political official in Serbia at the time, some media under the control of some other alienated intelligence structures, tycoons and grey power centers, continued the campaign against Subotić after released verdict had been pronounced before the Court of Appellation in Belgrade. The campaign aimed to prevent Subotić to conduct business in Serbia and to avoid payment of damage impairment, today is led by the daily newspaper Blic.[27][28]

Starting with the first false affair launched by the Zagreb weekly magazine Nacional and up to 2012 there has been published 4.000 negative texts about Subotić stating different accusations against him that all were rejected through official court proceedings in Belgrade, and also in official investigations against Subotić based on requests by the governmental officials from Belgrade that have been conducted in USA and six European countries. Due to campaign of false news and unfounded accusations against him, Subotić imitated a proceeding in Switzerland against the company Ringier Axel Springer who is the owner of the Serbian tabloid Blic. The proceeding is still in progress.

Subotić is a Serbian national with permanent residence in Switzerland since 1997. He married Jagoda and they together have a daughter, Mia. He speaks Serbian and French languages.

• Official website
• Louis Max
• Cane Subotić gradi hotel u C. Gori, B92.net, 28 March 2007
• Prva hapšenja u aferi "Mreža", B92.net, 6 June 2007
• Raspisana poternica za Subotićem, Politika.rs, 15 June 2007