It’s themorning of July 25, 2025, in Belgrade, and a BMW is seen driving up to the entrance of Serbia’s government headquarters. The door opens, revealing a gray-haired, middle-aged man, wearing a navy blue suit. The man is brandishing crutches, and as he exits the vehicle he readies himself, and begins hobbling towards the door. Out of nowhere, a bullet strikes him in the chest, sending the man to the ground. The man is, was,Zoran Djindjic, Serbia’s first democratically-elected prime minister following the era of notorious war criminalSlobodan Milosevic, andthese are the final moments in the opening episode ofOperation Sabre, the eight-episode series onMax.
Operation Sabredetails the aftermath of the tragic assassination of the 50-year-old reformer, a pivotal moment in modern Serbian history thatVarietycallsits “very own Kennedy moment.“The series is the firstto tell the story of Djindjic’s death through a television drama, a story that still haunts the public in the region 21 years after the fact. The series starsMilica Gojkovicas Danica Mandic, a young journalist looking for the truth behind the assassination of Djindjic, played byDragan MicanovicofLayer Cake. It’s a noble but decidedly dangerous pursuit, but she’s not in it alone, with police inspector Boris Rakic (Ljubomir Bandovic), tasked with finding the killer, helping her along.The truth they’re looking for is a dark one, full of corruption, accusations of torture, and more.
A disclaimer appearsin the opening minutes ofOperation Sabre, one that says the series “is not a documentary, but a work of fiction.“Of the disclaimer, co-directorGoran Stankovicsays, “If you make a show like this, there is a danger that people start thinking that you are claiming to have the real historical truth, and we didn’t really want this.” It’s an odd statement for a series documenting a real event, but necessary, as we’ll touch on soon. Now that said, following the disclaimer is real historical footage of protests from late September 2000, sparked by outrage over a presidential election that Milosevic’s opponents claimed he had rigged.
Slobodan Milosevic was a monster, period,the first European head of stateto be prosecuted for genocide and war crimes. From 1991 to 1999,his name was synonymous with chaos and mass murder in South-Eastern Europe, a legacy that left more than 200,000 dead and 2 million people homeless in Bosnia, 800,000 Albanians ethnically cleansed from their homes in Kosovo, had opponents and friends alike murdered, and openly defied UN and EU foreign policymaking and peacekeeping efforts, among other atrocities.
During his era, Milosevic fixed and challenged elections to stay in power, but his last attempt in 2000 was met with the aforementioned protests, and resulted in him ceding power toVojislav Kostunica, a properly-elected candidate put forward by a group of democratic-minded opposition parties, 18 in all, brought together by Djindjic (perBalkan Insight). Then, in March 2001, Zoran Djindjic, now Serbian prime minister, gave orders to arrest Milosevic, surrendering him to the US military, who flew him to the Hague to face trial for his crimes. Two years later, Djindjic, who was seen as either a leader destined to restore prosperity or a traitor who surrendered Milosevic, catering to the Americans,was dead, sparking Operation Sabre.
‘Operation Sabre’ Finds Twelve People Inolved in Djindjic’s Death
Following Djindjic’s death, real footage is used again to show hundreds of thousands of mourners walking through the streets of Belgrade, strewing flowers, before returning to the titular dragnet. The idea to assassinate Djindjic was hatched by three men in February 2003 (perBalkan Insight):Dejan “Bagzi” Milenkovic, a 33-year-old member of the Zemun Clan, a Serbian Mafia gang operating out of Belgrade;Zoran Vukojevic, a former policeman working as a security guard for the head of the Zemun Clan, andBranislav Bezarevic, who worked for the Security Information Agency, Serbia’s national intelligence agency. Bezarevic was paid 50,000 euros for information about the prime minister’s movements, which led to the tragedy. The gunman was oneZvezdan Jovanovic, a member of the State Security Service’s Special Operations Unit, the JSO, andmarked the successful completion of the operation, a joint effort by the JSO and the Zemun Clan, state security operatives, and gangsters banding together.
Authorities immediately initiateda state of emergency, which would remain in place until July 18, 2025, and Operation Sabre, with its primary goal to find Djindjic’s killer, but would expand beyond its original scope to include Serbia’s criminal underworld, security officers, and corrupt politicians.Over the course of Operation Sabre, 11,665 people were detained, with 3,946 of them being charged with murder, attempted murder, four kidnappings, and other criminal activity, and the twelve people who were actively involved in Djindjic’s death. The twelve includedMilorad “Legija” Ulemek, former commander of the Special Operations Unit and the mastermind of the killing;Dusan “Siptar” SpasojevicandMile “Kum” Lukovic, heads of the Zemun Clan; Zvezdan Jovanovic, the gunman; and Branislav Bezarevic, who was involved from the outset. It would seem that Operation Sabre was a success, bringing Djindjic’s killers to justice, and dismantling the Zemun Clan. What’s wrong with that?Much.
Authorities Used ‘Operation Sabre’ as Justification for Torture
It wasn’t the end result, but the means taken to get there that were very problematic. In areport releasedby Amnesty International, concerns were raised about ”detailed allegations of torture of detainees in connection with Operation Sabre by security forces, including asphyxiation by taping plastic or other material bags over the head, beatings, electric shocks to the head and body, and mock executions.” Dozens of cases were submitted as evidence by detainees, their family members, or their lawyers, but the fear of being arrested again or facing pressure led many to be too intimidated to openly talk about their experiences (Stankovic and the show’s writers went throughthousands of pagesof these court documents, looking to capture a version of events that skewed as close as possible to details, which he adds was “deeply disturbing”). Arguably more disturbingis the factthatit marked the first time since Slobodan Milosevic’s fall that Amnesty openly accused Serbia of serious violations of human rights.
Rasim Ljajic, minister for human and minority rights, denied the allegations, saying, “There was no ill-treatment of detainees in prisons,” but confessed to not knowing the conditions in which suspects were subjected to while detained in police stations. Police chiefSreten Lukicalso refuted the allegations, saying, “Torture is not a method used by Serbian police.” He did, however, promise an inquiry, a promise that many human rights groups doubted would ever be held. ”Apart from cosmetic changes, the police force remained mostly the same [from Milosevic era],” says Natasa Kandic of the Humanitarian Law Centre in Belgrade (perIPS News), ”One has serious doubts that the people who were engaged in torture, ethnic cleansing or other atrocities in the Milosevic era could have changed their ways.”
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The people of Serbia further complicate the matter. Co-directorVladimir Tagicexplains that the Serbian people are very divided: “Many see it [Operation Sabre] as the moment when criminals within a deeply corrupt [political] system were arrested, put on trial, and finally faced justice, but others remember the police operation as a form of stste terror against political opponents.” Polls at the time, perIPS News, indicated that nearly 70% of Serbians surveyed supported the initiative, happy that police took action against criminals, gang leaders, and drug dealers. The downfall of Milosevic was supported by the people, which made it easier to persecute him, butwith the majority supporting Operation Sabre due to the results, it became that much more difficult.
The creative team behindOperation Sabrechose to use fictional characters to drive the narrative, with Stankovic saying (perDeadline), “Having these characters helped us tell a point of view of a story that wasn’t enslaved within the facts.” But another part of the reasoning has to do with thecharacters based on real people. Says producerSnezana van Houwelingen: “Politicians who are in power now were also in power back then. People who killed him, so many of them are out of jail. They are alive, and we call them by their names, so we had to be careful and protect ourselves legally.” The mix of archival footage, dramatic reenactments, and characters both real and fictional has paid off in spades, withOperation Sabrean undeniable hit, and for a country that still reels in pain from the sheer memory of Djindjic’s assassination and its ugly aftermath,drawing attention back might be a needed part of the healing process.
Operation Sabre
Operation Sabreis available to stream on Max
