BELGRADE, Serbia-Montenegro-Police on Saturday detained a man claiming to have received an offer to assassinate Serbia's billionaire businessman and opposition politician Bogoljub Karic.

The man, whose name was not revealed, was detained while meeting with Karic's lawyers and confiding to them about the alleged offer to kill Karic for the fee of €600,000 (US$728,000), police spokeswoman Dragana Kajganic said.

Kajganic described the case as "banal" and the man as "a con artist and a gambler with a criminal record," but Karic's lawyer, Slobodan Soskic, insisted that the threat to the billionaire entrepreneur was genuine and demanded a thorough investigation.

Police said Karic's lawyers tipped them off about the meeting, though his lawyers insisted authorities wiretapped their phones.

The man's detention came amid a developing confrontation between Karic and Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica whose government last month revoked a license for the country's main wireless carrier, Mobtel, formerly owned by Karic.

Karic is also under investigation for allegedly trying to bribe lawmakers loyal to Kostunica and lure them to switch to Karic's increasingly popular Strength of Serbia Movement.

Karic recently accused Kostunica's secret service of planning to kill him.

The latest allegation came after the man called Karic's lawyers volunteering to reveal details of the alleged plot that he was presumably not willing to carry out.

"We met in a Belgrade cafe but police suddenly appeared and took him away before he could specify who exactly offered him the money," to kill Karic, said the lawyer, Soskic.

The lawyer suggested that the authorities might be behind the alleged assassination plan and that the man "asked nothing in return, he only wanted to meet with Karic personally to reveal what is being prepared against him."

Kajganic dismissed this as "insinuation," but confirmed that the suspect was being interrogated in a Belgrade precinct.

Last May, Karic sold his stake in Mobtel to an Austrian consortium, but the company remains under investigation for a series of allegedly illegal contracts and tax evasion.

The dispute prompted a visit this week by Austrian Vice Chancellor Hubert Gorbach, who met with Kostunica in Belgrade.

Janury 21, 2006 3:07 PM