Nikola Moraca, the journalist of the EuroBlic daily and SrpskaInfo web portal, has sued Milorad Dodik, the President of Bosnia's Republika Srpska entity, for defamation.

Moraca filed a lawsuit before Banja Luka Basic Court, demanding the compensation of 2,900 marks (approx 1,450 euro) to be paid to him for the damage to his reputation caused by presenting inaccurate and harmful allegations.

According to the lawsuit, Nikola Moraca and Aleksandar Trifunovic, editor of the Buka web portal, were victims of an attack by unknown perpetrators who scratched their cars at the parking lot in front of the building where they live with their families.

The lawsuit also points out the fact that Moraca was previously called as a witness, and then as a suspect, to reveal the source of the information for the article that he published, and when he did not do so, by order of the prosecutor, his mobile phone was confiscated, which created a sense of threat. All this took place at the moment when authorities of Republika Srpska prepared and then adopted the amendments to the Criminal Code, introducing the criminalisation of defamation. According to the lawsuit, Dodik made sure with his “reckless and insulting statements that “such a tense atmosphere was not enough.”

Also, the lawsuit notes that prior to the attack on Moraca's property, Dodik labelled journalists as “creatures” and created an atmosphere that was conducive to the attack.

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“The prosecutor's attacker interpreted it as a call for citizens to take matters into their own hands and send a message to the “creatures”,” reads the lawsuit, which reminds that soon after the attack on the journalists’ property, Dodik told a press conference that “there are indications that they organised it themselves.”

“The sentence the defendant uttered reverberated throughout the region. At that moment, citizens could suspect that the attacks were staged by the victims themselves. Instead of sending a message to the attackers that they would be prosecuted.”

It was also emphasised that, in addition to becoming a liar and manipulator in the eyes of the people, because he misled the public, Moraca also became an easy target for all potential attackers, and the actual attacker could breathe a sigh of relief, because the president of Republika Srpska personally blamed Moraca and Trifunovic themselves.

Finally, it was emphasised that the attacker was found and it was determined that Moraca and Trifunovic did not attack themselves, and that Dodik's words were a complete untruth that he “consciously and intentionally said at the press conference in the capacity of the Republika Srpska President.”

“Given that the RS President in his statements not only presented incorrect information, but also directed it against me personally, therefore, I had no choice but to seek justice through the courts. The amount of 2,900 marks was set symbolically because this procedure seeks justice so that no one in the future finds themselves in the situation that my family and I were in,” Moraca told Nezavisne daily.