Serbian prosecutors suspect organised crime group used licensed company in North Macedonia to traffic nearly five tonnes of marijuana into Serbia – a case that raised questions about possible spillover from North Macedonia’s medical marijuana farms.
Katarina Baletic
Serbia’s Public Prosecutor’s Office for Organised Crime filed an indictment on Tuesday accusing six alleged members of an organised crime group of producing and trafficking drugs within Serbia and North Macedonia during 2025 until January 29, 2026.
The prosecution on Wednesday said the indictment was filed against Aleksandar Mijajlovic as the organiser, Ivan Dragnic as the co-organiser, and Nebojsa Spasojevic, Rade Spasojevic, Uros Mladenovski and Robert Zivkovic as members of the same crime group.
“The evidence collected … indicates that the organisers devised the group’s operational structure, established its hierarchy, assigned roles among its members in advance, and secured the financial resources necessary to carry out the criminal plan,” the prosecution said in a press release.
The group is suspected of transporting nearly five tonnes of marijuana from North Macedonia to Serbia and storing it in residential and commercial premises used by Nebojsa and Rade Spasojevic in the village of Konjuh, near Krusevac, central Serbia, where the drugs were repackaged and prepared for distribution to end-buyers.
Spasojevic was a local official of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party, SNS, at the time of the bust. Serbian Defence Minister Bratislav Gasic, himself from Krusevac, denied the party was involved and repeated that it was clear that there are “no protected individuals” in Serbia because they had arrested Spasojevic.
The suspects are charged with using the company Alfapharm Group, based in Skopje, as a legitimate business entity to cover the narcotics production.
The company held permits issued by the authorities in North Macedonia to cultivate and produce cannabis extracts for medical purposes.
“The company was misused to conceal the organisation of the procurement, storage, repackaging, and transportation of large quantities of the narcotic drug marijuana,” the press release said.
According to the prosecution, in November 2025, the group organised the procurement of 8,832 kilograms of dried cannabis flower from the supplier CBD Med Plant from Strumica, North Macedonia.
The drugs were stored at the premises of Alfapharm Group, weighed, repackaged and prepared for transportation. The group used documentation relating to the export of textile goods for this during international transport.
The indictment added that Robert Zivkovic is charged with managing storage of the drugs, supervising the packaging process, organising their transportation, and overseeing their unloading and storage in Serbia. Nebojsa and Rade Spasojevic are alleged to have been responsible for receiving, storing, repackaging, and arranging the further transport of the drugs.
Serbian police arrested Uros Mladenovski at the end of January in Belgrade, when he collected around a hundred kilograms of marijuana from Spasojevic’s premises and transported it to the capital.
During searches of the residential and business premises used by the Spasojevic family, police discovered various arms, such as automatic firearms, ammunition, and a “Zolja” hand-held anti-tank rocket launcher.
Dragnic, Nebojsa and Rade Spasojevic and Mladenovski are in detention.
Zivkovic is a fugitive. A detention order has been issued for him, and both domestic and international arrest warrants have been sought.
Aleksandar Mihailovic was arrested in Austria on July 1 and a Serbian request for his extradition is pending.
The prosecution added that proceedings are being conducted before the North Macedonian authorities as well, and that both countries “continue to cooperate and exchange information within the framework of international legal assistance”.
Serbia’s authorities on January 29 seized five tons of marijuana in the village of Konjuh, which the Serbian prosecution then suggested may have originated from North Macedonia. A week later, North Macedonia police seized more than 40 tons of drugs.
The record-breaking seizures in both countries fuelled questions about whether North Macedonia’s legalisation of marijuana grown for medicinal purposes in 2016 has encouraged illegal production and smuggling.
