ZAGREB (AFP) -- Former U.S. ambassador to Croatia William Montgomery, who currently lives in the former Yugoslav republic, has been given police protection after threats, a police official said Saturday.

Speaking to the state-run HINA news agency, Ivan Kukrika did not elaborate on the nature of the threats.
Local media said Saturday that both Montgomery, who lives near the southern Adriatic town of Dubrovnik, and the police were informed by U.S. intelligence that an attack against him was being allegedly prepared.
The Jutarnji List daily noted that Montgomery was on the board of a British-Croatian hotel group, GSRH, and is to testify in a forthcoming bribery trial linked to the group.
A senior Croatian civil servant and the boss of a local construction company are charged with seeking 320,000 euros (400,000 dollars) in bribes from GSRH head Goran Strok.
The bribes were allegedly sought in order to provide documents saying that one of the hotels owned by the group operates properly.
The trial is to open within the next few weeks.
The Jutarnji List also recalled that Montgomery was close to a prominent Croatian journalist, Ivo Pukanic, who was killed last month in a bomb blast in Zagreb. Montgomery, 63, served as U.S. ambassador to Croatia from 1998 until 2000.
During the past few months the Croatian capital has experienced a wave of violence, including mafia-style murders, unknown since the country's independence from the former Yugoslavia in 1991.
Tackling organized crime is a key criteria Croatia must meet on its path towards membership in the European Union, which Zagreb hopes to join by 2011.