After vehicles belonging to Banja Luka journalists Aleksandar Trifunovic and Nikola Moraca were damaged Wednesday night, Bosnian Serb Presidency Chair Zeljka Cvijanovic condemned this incident asking for a full investigation, while the Republika Srpska (RS) entity President Milorad Dodik added that he allegedly heard that there are “indications that they [the journalists] were behind it.”
“There is no justification for the use of violence for any purpose, nor for endangering the safety of individuals and their property,” Cvijanovic pointed out in a statement for the Srna news agency.
She assessed that it is therefore important that the perpetrators of this crime be found and adequately sanctioned as soon as possible.
After the meeting of the RS ruling coalition in the Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik pointed out that the coalition is united in its commitment to include defamation in the RS Criminal Code and that they condemned the violence that happened last night.
Dodik's alleged indications
“The coalition condemned the harassment of journalists whose cars were scratched, as they said. We are asking for rigorous action by the Interior Ministry,” Dodik said, noting that he asked for everything to be clarified as soon as possible.
Particularly scandalous was his claim that there are alleged indications that journalists themselves were behind this incident and that he came to this conclusion after talking to the police.
“I was told that there are indications that they organized the activity themselves. There is no need for anyone to feel threatened. Republika Srpska has no intention of provoking any conflicts within itself”, he told the press, adding that he does not think that the journalistic community “stands behind some Vukelic or anyone else”.
Attack on N1 television
Dodik also accused some journalists of “taking money from USAID, buying the best cars and driving around town” and used this opportunity to attack N1 television.
“We have accurate information on which media are promoting foreign politicians as patriots. We don't believe in the good intentions of N1 here. I am ready to talk with those against [the Defamation Law] after the adoption of the Draft Law,” Dodik stressed.
“This was done in accordance with European standards. We will adopt all European laws in a public debate. This law is in accordance with American practice,” he added, repeating that there is no threatened prison sentence as “it has only one intention to bring more responsibility and respect to the public discourse.”
Journalists fear for their lives
Following the damage to their cars journalists Aleksandar Trifunovic and Nikola Moraca told N1 that they felt unsafe and that all alarms should be activated.
“The most powerful politician, practically the owner of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, called us slobs yesterday. The reaction of our colleagues was very mild, it seems that only we who are attacked are reacting against it. It was expected that someone understood this as an order, out of a hundred cars in this parking lot, only the cars of my colleague Moraca and mine were brutally damaged. The damage looks so violent that it’s disturbing. Those cars look so brutally violated that I can only imagine what that man could have done to us if he had found us in them,” Trifunovic said.
Moraca said he felt an atmosphere of fear was being created.
“It is as if messages are being sent that if we continue to go in this direction we know what will happen. I want to thank the police who came in record time, they conducted the investigation, and there is a video that shows everything, I hope that all this will be over as soon as possible. This all crossed, not one, but two red lines. We feel threatened and we hope that all of this will turn into something good, one naturally feels that way, but something strange is happening here,” Moraca concluded.
Reactions to this incident came from the police who said that the investigation has been completed and that they are working to shedding light on this case, while the Association of Journalists of Bosnia and Herzegovina publicly condemned the attack and demanded an immediate investigation.
