Chinese citizen Cui Guanghai and Briton John Miller, who escaped from house arrest in Belgrade at the beginning of August, had permission to use mobile phone and the internet, it says BIRN.
BIRN also learns that the High Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade needed ten days to propose to the court the detention and the issuance of warrants for the two fugitives. Their lawyer says in the conversation that he thinks that they did not run away, but that they were kidnapped by the Americans.
Back in mid-May of this year, when the High Court in Belgrade made a decision that two arrested foreigners, whose extradition is sought by the USA, should be replaced by house arrest with electronic monitoring, lawyers warned that exactly what they were pointing to would happen - escape from house arrest, the text states. Their warnings came true in the early morning of August 4th, when Cui Guanghai and John Miller managed to escape.
BIRN: A Chinese and a Briton, whose extradition is sought by the US, escaped from house arrest in Belgrade
It is about a Chinese and a British citizen who were arrested on April 24, 2025 in the Belgrade Hyatt hotel on the basis of an American international warrant for espionage, after which a request was submitted for their extradition. Just one month later, on May 21, the High Court ruled that their prison terms should be reduced to house arrest, which lawyers considered unusual and risky from the start.
BIRN learns that the defendants had access to a mobile phone and the Internet during house arrest, which additionally raises the question of whether the measure imposed on them is adequate considering the potential risk of escape.
BIRN also learns why it took 11 days to issue a warrant for the fugitives Cuje and Miller. The High Court states that immediately after receiving the notification from the Administration for the Execution of Criminal Sanctions, on August 5, they informed the High Public Prosecutor's Office and asked for an opinion, but that the prosecutor's office did not submit the proposal for ordering custody and issuing a warrant for the fugitives until August 15. After that, on the same day, the High Court issued a decision on detention and an order to issue a warrant.
According to this media, lawyer Goran Petronijević, who represents two foreign citizens, believes that they are not on the run, but that they were kidnapped, and that immediately after hearing the information that they had disappeared, he asked for an explanation from the competent authorities.
When the BIRN journalist stated that someone trying to escape doesn't really try to take their luggage with them, Petronijević said that those were really necessary personal items. He added that he suspects that his clients were kidnapped, and that the kidnapping was organized by the country that is looking for them - America.
Sources close to the case believe that the kidnapping scenario is unlikely, the text states.
At the same time, the American authorities did not announce anything about this case - BIRN's questions sent to the Ministry of Justice and the FBI were not answered.
Read more about this topic at BIRN portal
