Soon after the murder, some commentators identified the possibility of a Yugoslav or Serb connection. In early 1999 the UK was in a state of undeclared war with Serbia. Direct evidence supporting this theory is limited. Immediately after the Dando killing a number of telephone calls were made to the BBC and other media outlets claiming responsibility for the killing on behalf of Serb groups. The callers spoke with central European accents and threatened further killings. These calls were not judged wholly credible and may have been hoaxes. Nevertheless, at George's first trial, his defence barrister, Michael Mansfield QC, proposed that the Serbian warlord leader Arkan had ordered Dando's assassination in retaliation for the NATO bombing of Radio Television of Serbia's headquarters on 23 April 1999. Sixteen station staff had died in the bombing. Mansfield suggested that Dando's earlier presentation of an appeal for aid for Kosovar Albanian refugees may have attracted the attention of Bosnian-Serb hardliners.