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Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic on Tuesday confirmed that plans to redevelop the former Yugoslav army headquarters in Belgrade into a hotel will not proceed after an investment firm linked to U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law withdrew from the project.
“We will now be left with a destroyed building, and it is only a matter of time before bricks and other parts start falling off it, because no one will ever touch it again,” Vucic told reporters in Belgrade.
On Monday, Miami-based investment firm Affinity Partners, founded by Jared Kushner, told The Wall Street Journal it was pulling out of the project.
“Meaningful projects should unite rather than divide, and out of respect for the people of Serbia and the city of Belgrade, we are withdrawing our application and stepping aside at this time,” a spokesman for the firm said.
The withdrawal followed indictments against Serbian Culture Minister Nikola Selakovic and three other officials over alleged abuse of office and forgery related to the removal of the site’s cultural-heritage status.
Organized crime prosecutors said the indictments stem from an official document that allowed the former headquarters to lose its protected status. Plans to transform the bombed-out complex into a high-rise hotel stalled in May after allegations emerged that the revocation had been based on a forged document.
Prosecutors said the acting head of the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Monuments, Goran Vasic, admitted to forging the document. Vasic, Selakovic and two other officials were indicted. If convicted, they could face up to five years in prison.
Despite the ongoing investigation, lawmakers last month moved to fast-track the development, arguing it was urgent. The move sparked protests in Belgrade, where demonstrators called for the ruins to be preserved for their modernist architecture and as a memorial to the 1999 NATO bombing that damaged the building.
Affinity Partners had signed a 99-year land deal with the Serbian government last year to redevelop the site shortly after its cultural asset status was revoked.
Vucic, who has hosted Kushner several times and publicly backed the project, previously said he would pardon anyone charged over the development.
“I will not give them the opportunity to prosecute those who are not guilty of anything. I am guilty. I am the one who wanted Serbia’s modernisation. I am the one who wanted to bring in a major investor,” Vucic said on Monday during a visit to the southern city of Nis.
The president blamed critics of the project for derailing an investment he valued at “at least 750 million euros” ($880 million).
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