ZAGREB, June 25, 2018 – The Croatian Journalists Association (HND) on Monday condemned in the strongest terms a physical assault on Zadar journalist Hrvoje Bajlo, who sustained severe injuries, and demanded a swift and clear response from the state authorities.
The HND said Bajlo, owner of the Zadar News portal and correspondent of the Index.hr portal and Nacional weekly, was brutally assaulted on Sunday evening at a parking lot in the coastal city by Jakov Surač, former player for the Zadar Football Club and now a businessman.
According to Bajlo, before physically assaulting him, the attacker insulted him for writing for the “Chetnik Index” and for Nacional, and threatened that he would “behead” him if he continued to write about his friends Zdravko Livaković, Božidar Kalmeta and the HDZ party. The attacker then punched him in the head and body, pushed him to the ground and kicked him, causing Bajlo to briefly black out. Bajlo suffered a fractured right arm and numerous injuries to the head and body which the Zadar hospital’s ER said were severe.
The HND recalled that Bajlo recently published on Zadar News a list of assets of Livaković, a former state secretary at the transport and infrastructure ministry, seized by the USKOK anti-corruption office as part of the Remorker case in which he, former HDZ minister Kalmeta and another dozen persons were accused of siphoning over 15 million kuna from state companies.
The HND said this was not the first time Bajlo was insulted, threatened and intimidated, and that despite the criminal reports he had filed, the police had not solved any case.
The HND demanded decisive action from the police and the judiciary as well as “clear and unambiguous condemnation” by the highest political officials “of the increasingly frequent threats and assaults on journalists.”
“By keeping quiet and downplaying attacks such as those by War Veterans Minister Tomo Medved against Index journalist Vojislav Mazzocco, the highest state institutions openly side with those attacking fundamental journalistic rights and free speech, inciting an atmosphere of fear and violence in society,” the HND said.
