Secret Services Against Journalists

Zagreb Nov 30, 1998

AIM Zagreb, 27 November, 1998

It seems that journalists in Croatia can choose between two possibilities - they can either collaborate with the police or be the subject of its observation, be either its informers or suspects, be either denouncers or the denounced. The split in the ruling leadership and departure of some of the closest associates of the Croatian president revealed plenty of dirty laundry directly in the presidential palace. One of the central roles in this conflict was played by secret services. By now already former head of Tudjman's office Sarinic accused the most powerful president's advisor Pasalic of having used services of military intelligence officers in his attempt to seize full control of the Croat Democratic Community (HDZ) and destroy his rivals.

Disputes about operation of secret services, among other, affected the ranks of the journalists. It was undoubtedly confirmed what was noticeable before - some media very closely cooperate with the police. Not only the media close to the regime carry information which obviously originate from secret sources, but certain journals literally can be claimed to belong to the police - they were started by secret services, they are financed and editted by them. In this sense, one can even say this has become traditional. At the time of the past war, tabloid Slobodni tjednik published lists of suspected Serbs and persons from these lists mysteriously disappeared afterwards. Via such dirty media a hysterical campaign is constantly waged against everything that is opposed to Tudjman's authorities. It turned out that weekly Imperijal is the cat's paw of the right wing of the HDZ. Its masters in politics and the police use this journal to destroy even rivals within their own party.

Media and journalists who are not dancing attendance on the police, cannot escape from it either. Those who are not its collaborators - they become the objects of its actions. The public is flooded by information which show that the police is massively and systematrically tapping and tailing journalists.

Trying to protect their interests with the help pf the public, certain renegades from the ruling party have put official police documents on independent media and numerous journalists in circulation. Tudjman's former close associate Sarinic who is now in disfavour, enabled some newspapers access to their police files. Djurdjica Klancir, editor of weekly Globus, claims that she is appalled by what she has read. The police report about her and other journalists of her newspaper includes details of intimate nature which could have been acquired only by tapping their phones over a long period of time. Their profesional work is just mentioned, a much larger part is devoted to their intimate life. "I was shocked to read that police analysts dared evalute the successfulness of my marriage. What I have read unambiguously confirmed that all telephones in the editorial premises of Globus are tapped, most probably our private telephones as well, that they are making inquiries about us, that they are watching, maybe even tailing us. Whole teams of agents are engaged in spying on journalists, tapping their phones, processing data on them. Their sexual affinities are studied, health records, inclination to alcohol... Data are collected which can in no way be said to be necessary for security reasons", says editor Klancir.

Similar is the testimony of the editor of Nacional, Ivo Pukanic, who about two months ago published that during an excursion outside Zagreb he came across agents who were following him. He also got a police report from Sarinic, which deals with almost all members of his editorial team. In the document, he says, exact dates of all their contacts were listed, even those made by phone and completely private. According to Pukanic, in order to collect that amount of data, for the control of Nacional it was necessary to engage at least about thirty agents over a period of six months. Via police controlled Imperijal, this weekly is accused of being an agent of former general staff of the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA).

Feral Tribune is not on such good terms with Sarinic, so it has never had the chance to read its police file. But this weekly writes that in the past few days, agents of secret services have tried to rectruit its journalists. They were offered to be engaged in informing about all those who the regime believes to be its enemies. The offer was corroborated by insinuations that some of the journalists of this weekly are in connection with the so-called Labrador group, members of which were accused of espionage and terrorism, and finally it was supported by the threat that, in case they refused to cooperate, Feral would be exposed to a new lynch, and police files of its journalists would be published on pages of Imperijal.

After all these discoveries, it has become clear how it could have happened that recently some media carried the health documentation of Feral's journalist Drago Hedl. On electronic addresses of numerous newspapers' editorial teams an unsigned text appeared reporting about Hedl's attempt to commit suicide. Accompanied by numerous political insinuations, original medical findings were enclosed. The author of the electronic nauseating message suggested that the journalist "with suicidal impulse" was "dangerous for himslef and his surroundings", and the insinuation sent by e-mail ended with the following message: "For 'free-thinking' and all other journalists to consider!" The unsigned text which without authority impinges upon literally the intestines of a journalist, found its way in a hurry to the pages of some newspapers which are close to the authorities, announced as a sensation on the front pages.

Minister of police Ivan Penic arrogantly tried to deny allegations of journalists about their tapped phones. First, he established that journalists speak about police spying on them for inimical motives. He literally said that they opened the question of tapped phones because they wished to unstable the Ministry of Internal Affairs, that is the Republic of Croatia, and then quite calmly confirmed that journalists were watched, not because of their profession, but, as he said, as "part of the problem of security". The minister's denial in fact confirmed the practice of massive police treatment of media workers. Moreover, he accused journalists of activities against the state.

Even if one accepted the completely unexplained allegation that journalists are tapped as "part of the problem of security", Penic did not answer an equally important question: why are primarily data of quite private nature collected and how could state security be defended by recording journalists' intimacies. All those who have seen the files claim that the police diligently registered data which can in no way be linked to problems of security. If journalists are suspected as potential destroyers of the constitutional system, if they are being followed because they may "threaten national security", why is the police primarily interested in their sexual inclinations and private vices? Files compiled by Penic's police can be used only to blackmail or compromise private lives of journalists.

A large part of the public is appalled by these findings, although the fact that the media are being closely watched - did not come as a surprise. The head of the state has so many times called journalists who refused to be under his wing scoundrels who have sold their souls, fighters in the special war against Croatia and used similar abusive language. Tudjman does not joke about such things, he really means them, and his abuses are - an order for the police. If the president of the Republic publicly and repeatedly marks certain persons as enemies of Croatia - it is quite logical for the police to tap their phones and spy on them.

In this context it is not insignificant that the man who was in charge of the process of privatisation is at the post of the minister of police. The public in Croatia considers privatisation the greatest plunder in Croatian history and the media are constantly reporting about tremendous foul dealings by means of which circles connected with the political elite have seized most of the national wealth. The minister of police as well as his superior are afraid of such writing. In explaining the reasons for tapping journalists, Penic openly admits this. He says that "there are frequent threats to national security by revealing and publishing confidential documents and information, even betraying state and military secrets, as well as threatening national security by publishing untruth and misinformation".

The point is that those in power - the minister of police who by law has the arbitrary right to decide who intends to destroy Croatia and should be followed, and the head of the state who is his inspirer - consider to be untrue what most of the Croatian public believes to be true. The logical outcome of such a situation is that thieves have taken the lead in Croatia, and the police is hunting those whose profession demands - to investigate, to testify, and not to be silent by any means and at any cost.

JELENA LOVRIC