Belgrade - Serbian police were set Sunday to question reporters over the disclosure of a secret state plan to spend one million dollars to keep a fugitive from US justice authorities, Belgrade newspapers said Sunday.

Police said they were seeking the owner and chief editor of the daily Borba over a report that Serbia would pay to relieve pressure for the extradition of Miladin Kovacevic, charged last May over a near-fatal assault of a fellow student in the United States.

Kovacevic, a 21-year-old former basketball player at Binghamton University in New York, is accused of assaulting fellow student Bryan Steinhauer in a bar brawl.

Sunday newspapers quoted chief editor Olivera Zekic as saying police wanted to find out who leaked the information to Borba.

She said she would not reveal the source, and demanded instead that Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic's cabinet strip the Kovacevic decision of confidentiality.

Serbian state prosecutor Slobodan Radovanovic said reporters were not the target of the probe, but the person who leaked confidential decision to Borba, according to radio B92.

Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic's cabinet reportedly decided to cover a 900,000-dollar-compensation claim by the family of Kovacevic's victim and additional 100,000 for other expenses.

The plan would presumably alleviate pressure from Washington for Kovacevic's extradition and pave the way for a trial at home. Serbian law bans extradition of citizens for trials abroad.

But pressure was growing on Serbia because Kovacevic fled with the aid of Serbian diplomats, who issued him travel documents - instead of the passport held by police - after he posted bail.

While Kovacevic has the sympathy of many in Serbia - amid its muddled relations with the West - the plan to bail him out as the financial crisis began shaking the already fragile local economy has caused a public outcry.

Serbian officials had not commented on the leaked secret plan by Sunday, three days after it broke into the news. (dpa)