Dr. iur.
Vojislav Koštunica
Војислав Коштуница
Vojislav Koštunica speaking at the EPP Congress in Rome in 2006
Koštunica in 2006
8th Prime Minister of Serbia
In office
4 March 2004 – 7 July 2008
PresidentDragan Maršićanin (acting)
Vojislav Mihailović (acting)
Predrag Marković (acting)
Boris Tadić
DeputyMiroljub Labus
Ivana Dulić-Marković
Božidar Đelić
Preceded byZoran Živković
Succeeded byMirko Cvetković
4th President of FR Yugoslavia
In office
7 October 2000 – 7 March 2003
Prime MinisterMomir Bulatović
Zoran Žižić
Dragiša Pešić
Preceded bySlobodan Milošević
Succeeded bySvetozar Marović (as President of Serbia and Montenegro)
Personal details
Born (1944-03-24) 24 March 1944
Belgrade, German-occupied Serbia
Political partyDS (1990–1992)
DSS (1992–2014)
Spouse
Zorica Radović
​
​
(m. 1976; died 2015)​
Alma materUniversity of Belgrade
Signature

Vojislav Koštunica (Serbian Cyrillic: Војислав Коштуница, pronounced [ʋǒjislaʋ koʃtǔnit͡sa] ⓘ; born 24 March 1944) is a Serbian former politician who served as the last president of FR Yugoslavia from 2000 to 2003 and as the prime minister of Serbia from 2004 to 2008.[1]

Koštunica won the 2000 Yugoslav presidential election as a candidate of a broad alliance Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS), which led to overthrow of Slobodan Milošević and the withdrawal of international sanctions against Yugoslavia. He strictly opposed cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and his party left the coalition government in protest at the decision to extradite Slobodan Milošević to the ICTY. After the 2003 Serbian parliamentary election, the first elections after the dissolution of DOS and assassination of Prime Minister Zoran Đinđić, Koštunica formed a minority government with the support of the Milošević's Socialist Party of Serbia and became the head of government. He was one of the crucial figures in the adoption of the first constitution of an independent Serbia, as well as for declaring Serbia a neutral country. During his second government (2007–2008), he opposed signing the Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) with the European Union, leading to the fall of the government after a year and the early elections won by pro-European parties.

He was one of the founders and the first president of the Democratic Party of Serbia from its creation in 1992 until 19 March 2014, when he resigned as party president and retired from active politics after his party failed to reach the 5% threshold to enter the Parliament on March 16 elections for the first time in its history.[2] In October 2014, he left the party after disagreements with the new party leadership over what he saw as their abandonment of the policy of political neutrality.[3] In November 2014, he was one of the founders of the right-wing eurosceptic "Statehood Movement of Serbia".[4][5]

Early life and education

Koštunica was born on 24 March 1944 in his family home in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.[6] As a youth he went by the nickname 'Voja'.[1] He was educated in Belgrade, where he finished elementary school, and graduated from the Second Belgrade High School in 1962. Koštunica enrolled in the University of Belgrade's Faculty of Law the same year, graduating in 1966.[1] He earned his master's degree in 1970 and his Ph.D. in 1974 with his thesis "Institutionalized Opposition in the Political System of Capitalism".[1]

Koštunica was an assistant at the faculty from 1970 until 1974, when he left due to a political purge at the university for criticising the communist regime of Josip Broz Tito.[1] After his expulsion, Koštunica worked at the Institute of Social Sciences, and from 1981 at the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, where he engaged in the protection of human rights, specifically in the defence of freedom of thought and expression.[1]

Political career

Koštunica was a founding member of the Democratic Party (DS) in 1989.[1] He left the Democratic Party in 1992 over opposing views in leadership and formed the Democratic Party of Serbia.[1]

President of Yugoslavia (2000–03)

President George W. Bush greets Vojislav Koštunica, then President of Yugoslavia, in the White House.

Supported by both nationalists and liberals, the Democratic Opposition of Serbia backed him in the 2000 presidential election against incumbent Slobodan Milošević.[7] Koštunica received 50.2 percent of the vote in the first round of voting,[7] just a few thousand votes over the threshold needed to win outright. Milošević disputed the results of the first round, claiming that Koštunica had only received 49 percent of the vote and a runoff was required. The Otpor movement, a student-led movement to oust Milošević and install free and fair elections, organized a protest where thousands of Serbians participated in strikes and took over the Belgrade capital and forced Milošević to accept the results and step down as president.[7] Koštunica then assumed the presidency.[8] He was the last president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.[9] Koštunica opposed the extradition of his predecessor, to the Hague Tribunal, and voiced opposition to the court.[10]

Prime Minister of Serbia (2004–08)

With Secretary Rice in Washington, D.C., on 12 July 2006.

Koštunica became prime minister in March 2004 at the head of the new minority government, albeit with the support of the Socialist Party of Serbia.[9]

Serbian parliamentary elections in January 2007 were inconclusive. On 15 May 2007 Koštunica agreed to form a fragile coalition government with Boris Tadić, with Koštunica continuing his role as Prime Minister and Tadić's party receiving 13 of 25 cabinet posts.[11]

On 8 March 2008, Koštunica called for new elections on 11 May after the collapse of his party's coalition with the Democratic Party over relations with the European Union and Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence.[12] Pro-EU candidate Boris Tadić and his Democratic Party wound up winning the parliamentary elections[13] and on July 7, a coalition between the Democrats and the Socialist Party was formed with Mirko Cvetković succeeding Koštunica as Prime Minister.[14]

Political positions

Koštunica in 2009

Koštunica is a conservative politician with strong anti-communist views but also critical of the West, namely the United States and the European Union.[15] In an interview with German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel, Koštunica stated he is "fairly close to de Gaulle", in his views.[16]

On Kosovo

On 21 February 2008, following Kosovo's declaration of independence, Koštunica made an emotional speech in Belgrade, which included the following:

Dear citizens of Serbia, Serbia! What is Kosovo? Where is Kosovo? Whose is Kosovo? Is there anyone among us who is not from Kosovo? Is there anyone among us who thinks that Kosovo does not belong to us? Kosovo – that's Serbia's first name. Kosovo belongs to Serbia. Kosovo belongs to the Serbian people. That’s how it has been for ever. That's how it's going to be for ever. There is no force, no threat, and no punishment big and hideous enough for any Serb, at any time, to say anything different but, Kosovo is Serbia! Never will anyone hear from us that the Patriarchate of Peć does not belong to us, that Visoki Dečani and Gračanica are not ours! That the place where we were born is not ours; we and our state and our church and everything that makes us what we are today! If we as Serbs renounce Serbianhood, our origin, our Kosovo, our ancestors and our history – then, who are we Serbs? What is our name then?[17]

Buses took thousands of supporters to the rally; some protestors then attacked embassies and looted shops.[18]

On 25 February 2008, Koštunica demanded that the United States rescind its recognition of Kosovo, warning that "there will be no stability until the fake state" is annulled.[19]

On the European Union

With Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on 27 October 2000.

On 4 April 2008, Koštunica stated that European Union membership was no longer on the agenda for Serbia. He stated that before EU integration could continue, Serbia and the EU must discuss the matter of Serbia's territorial integrity.[20]

He stated that Serbia must not by any means sign the Stabilisation and Association Agreement, which he referred to as "Solana's agreement".[21]

On 21 April 2008 Koštunica said that the SAA was in the interests of Olli Rehn and Javier Solana and not in Serbia's national interests. He also said that "the NATO pact cannot claim that Serbia recognised Kosovo’s independence with that signature." and that "the only thing the NATO pact will be able to claim is that individual parties signed Solana’s agreement."[22]

On 27 April 2008 he said that anyone who signed the SAA on behalf of Serbia would become an accomplice to tearing Serbia apart. He also implied there is a cover-up of something in the agreement by saying: "I am convinced every Serbian sees that things are being covered up, and that there is something seriously amiss with the Solana agreement." and he asked "who in Serbia dares to ignore these facts and conceal the real goal of Solana's agreement."[23]

On 28 April 2008 he said that "the signature will not be valid for Serbia and whoever signs the SAA will have to assume responsibility for such an act".[24]

On 1 May 2008 Koštunica said that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was right when he said that the SAA should have been signed before Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence and its recognition by 18 EU member states at the time.[25] One day later on 2 May 2008 he vowed to annul the agreement after the election, calling it "a trick", "Solana's agreement" and "the Tadić-Đelić SAA signature".[26] He said he refers to the act of signing of the SAA as anti-Constitutional and anti-state that leads to the breakup of Serbia.[27] A spokesperson of Koštunica's Democratic Party of Serbia stated that Tadić was putting a seal of Judas of his party coalition to the Solana Agreement by signing it.[28] On 4 May he called the document "a forgery and a trick".[29]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "Vojislav Koštunica – kandidat DSS-a". B92. Retrieved 15 August 2012.
  2. ↑ "Kostunica's resignation: Political retirement of last Serbian Euro-skeptic". balkaneu.com. 20 March 2014. Retrieved 3 May 2014.
  3. ↑ "Vojislav Koštunica napustio DSS". Vreme. 14 October 2014. Retrieved 1 September 2015.
  4. ↑ "Srbiji je potreban državotvorni pokret". dps.rs. 14 November 2014. Retrieved 1 September 2015.
  5. ↑ "Slobodan Samardžić predsednik Državotvornog pokreta Srbije". Blic. 13 June 2015. Retrieved 1 September 2015.
  6. ↑ "Vojislav Koštunica | last president of Yugoslavia and prime minister of Serbia | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 26 December 2021.
  7. 1 2 3 Johnston, Hank, ed. (2019). Social Movements, Nonviolent Resistance, and the State. Routledge. pp. 103–105. ISBN 978-0-42988-566-2.
  8. ↑ "Kostunica Takes Oath in Yugoslavia". CBS News. 21 September 2000.
  9. 1 2 "FACTBOX: Serbian PM Kostunica, a political acrobat". Reuters. 15 May 2007.
  10. ↑ Erlanger, Steven (2 April 2001). "Yugoslav Firm on His Stand to Bar Milosevic From Hague". The New York Times.
  11. ↑ "Serbia confirms new government". Al Jazeera. 15 May 2007.
  12. ↑ "Serbia's ruling coalition collapses". BBC. 8 March 2008.
  13. ↑ "Shock election win sets Serbia on path to EU". CNN. 12 May 2008.
  14. ↑ Bilefsky, Dan (7 July 2008). "Serbia approves pro-Western government". The New York Times.
  15. ↑ Vučković, Vladimir (2022). Universitätsbibliothek Graz Graz. "Colliding Western Balkan Neighbors: Serbia and Montenegro in Post- Yugoslav Context –Identity and Interest Representation: Research Article". Contemporary Southeastern Europe. 9: 2 p. 5480. doi:10.25364/02.9:2022.2.5.
  16. ↑ "English Summaries". Der Spiegel. 13 November 2000. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  17. ↑ "The Promise is Given, Kosovo is Serbia as Long as We Live". Tanjug, via Serbian Orthodox Church. 21 February 2008.
  18. ↑ Judah (2009). The Serbs. Yale University Press. p. 359. ISBN 978-0-300-15826-7.
  19. ↑ Kirka, Danica (26 February 2008). "Putin's Likely Successor, Pledging Support for Serbia, Signs Pipeline Deal". The Washington Post. Associated Press. p. A11.
  20. ↑ "Koštunica: EU membership not on agenda". B92. 4 April 2008. Archived from the original on 7 June 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  21. ↑ "Koštunica: Nikako ne potpisati SSP". mtsmondo.com. 9 April 2008. Archived from the original on 12 April 2008.
  22. ↑ "SAA not in Serbia's state interests". B92. 21 April 2008. Archived from the original on 7 June 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  23. ↑ "Koštunica on SAA: Who dares to become accomplice". B92. 26 April 2008. Archived from the original on 7 June 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  24. ↑ "Koštunica slams EU deal signing as anti-state". B92. 28 April 2008. Archived from the original on 7 June 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  25. ↑ "Koštunica agrees with Lavrov: SAA long overdue". B92. 1 May 2008. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  26. ↑ "EU deal signature will be annulled". B92. 2 May 2008. Archived from the original on 3 May 2008. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  27. ↑ "Koštunica: SAA breaking Serbia up". B92. 3 May 2008. Archived from the original on 7 June 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  28. ↑ "DSS: EU deal signature, seal of Judas". B92. 29 April 2008. Archived from the original on 7 June 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
  29. ↑ "Koštunica says signed EU deal is forgery". B92. 4 May 2008. Archived from the original on 7 June 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
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