15th of May, 2026
The Second Basic Court in Belgrade has ruled against the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation, ordering the Foundation to pay former State Security Service officers Miroslav Kurak, Ratko Romić and Milan Radonjić 200,000 dinars each in damages for harm to their honour and reputation, as well as an additional 435,000 dinars in legal costs. In total, the Foundation faces a payment of 1,035,000 dinars under the first-instance judgment.
Kurak, Romić and Radonjić filed the lawsuit against the Foundation in 2024 over a public statement expressing dissatisfaction with the Court of Appeal’s decision that same year to acquit them, by final judgment, of the murder of Slavko Ćuruvija on 11 April 1999.
After a nine-year trial and two first-instance judgments sentencing Kurak, Romić and Radonjić, together with former State Security Service chief Radomir Marković, to a combined total of 100 years in prison, the Court of Appeal acquitted them due to lack of evidence.
According to the Second Basic Court, the statement issued by the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation in response to that ruling, titled “A Country That Does Not Punish Murderers Has No Future”, violated the plaintiffs’ honour and reputation and caused them non-material damage in the form of emotional distress. The judgment states that the statement was offensive because, at the time of its publication, Radonjić, Romić and Kurak had already been finally acquitted of the murder. The court therefore awarded each plaintiff 200,000 dinars in damages, “finding that the awarded amounts would constitute fair satisfaction for the plaintiffs and that the amount is proportionate to the non-material damage suffered,” as stated in the ruling.
In its judgment, the court failed to take into account any of the Foundation’s arguments, including the fact that, in the meantime, the Supreme Court had established that the Court of Appeal judgment – to which the Foundation’s statement referred – had been rendered with serious violations of criminal procedure rules in favour of the defendants.
Given that the amount of damages awarded is entirely unprecedented in comparable domestic court practice in the same or similar cases, we believe this judgment sends a clear message, not only to us, but to the entire media community and the citizens of Serbia.
The entire judicial process concerning the murder of Slavko Ćuruvija, its outcome, and now the ruling against the Foundation established by the murdered journalist’s children, represent a continued form of pressure and tormenting of the survivors. The silencing of freedom of expression in the Ćuruvija case continues.
The Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation will appeal the first-instance judgment of the Second Basic Court. The proceedings before the Court of Appeal will be yet another test of the direction Serbia intends to take, and of its willingness to break with the dark legacy of the 1990s that continues to haunt us all.
