April 11, 2019
This Thursday marks twenty years since the murder of Slavko Ćuruvija, journalist and owner of the Dnevni Telegraf and Evropljanin publications (Daily Telegraph and The European). Journalists associations of Serbia will convene at noon in front of Svetogorska street, number 35, to commemorate the killing of the journalist with flowers and candles.
Ćuruvija was killed on 11th April 1999 in the passage leading to the building where he lived. An unknown assassin came from behind his back and shot him with 14 bullets inside two cartridges. While Slavko was shot, Branka Prpa, who accompanied him, received a blow to the head.
For the first time in 20 years, the anniversary of this crime is happening after an initial verdict had been proclaimed. The verdict was made public on April 5 by the Organized Crime Section of the Belgrade Higher Court.
The sentences were brought after almost four years of trial against the accused high-ranking officials of the State Security Services. Radomir Marković, former head of the State Security Department and Milan Radonjić, former chief of the Belgrade Centre of the State Security Department were each sentenced as organizers of this crime to 30 years in prison. Miroslav Kurak, former State Security Department reserve officer (still at large), and Ratko Romić, chief inspector of the Second Administration of the State Security Department were each sentenced to 20 years in prison.
It remains unknown as to who actually shot Slavko Ćuruvija, and the political background of the crime remains unclear, regardless of the fact that a number of indications point to whom might have ordered the shooting.
Representatives of the Association of Journalists of Serbia (UNS) and the Independent Association of Journalists of Serbia (NUNS), family, friends and admirers of Slavko Ćuruvija will meet at the same place they have met the past 19 years, in front of a commemorative plaque in the passage of Svetogorska street no. 35 where Ćuruvija was murdered.
