Dragan Tomić ( sr-cyrl, Драган Томић; 9 December 1935 – 21 June 2022) was a Serbian politician who served as the

president of the National Assembly of Serbia The president of the National Assembly of Serbia () is the presiding officer of the National Assembly of Serbia. The president is elected by members of each new assembly for a term lasting four years. The president of the National Assembly s ...

from 1994 to 2001. He was a member of the

Socialist Party of Serbia The Socialist Party of Serbia (, abbr. SPS) is a populist political party in Serbia. Ivica Dačić has led SPS as its president since 2006. SPS was founded in 1990 as a merger of the League of Communists of Serbia and Socialist Alliance ...

and was considered a loyal supporter of

Slobodan Milošević Slobodan Milošević ( sr-Cyrl, Слободан Милошевић, ; 20 August 1941 – 11 March 2006) was a Yugoslav and Serbian politician who was the President of Serbia between 1989 and 1997 and President of the Federal Republic of Yugos ...

. Tomić was director of RTV Politika, one of Serbia's main TV stations, and director of Jugopetrol AD, the state oil company. He was a member of the

League of Communists of Yugoslavia The League of Communists of Yugoslavia, known until 1952 as the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, was the founding and ruling party of SFR Yugoslavia. It was formed in 1919 as the main communist opposition party in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats ...

. After Milošević reached the end of his two allowed terms as

President of Serbia The president of Serbia (), officially styled as President of the Republic (), is the head of state of Serbia. The current officeholder is Aleksandar Vučić, who was elected in 2017 and has held the role since 31 May 2017. According to the C ...

and got himself elected as

President of Serbia and Montenegro President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Film and television *'' Præsident ...

, Tomić by default became acting President of Serbia, from 23 July to 29 December 1997. In the second cabinet of the Prime Minister Mirko Marjanović, Tomić was the

Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia The Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia (, literally translated as Vice President of the Government of Serbia), is the official Deputy prime minister, Deputy of the Prime Minister of Serbia, Prime Minister of Serbia. According to convention, one d ...

, from 1998 to 2000. Tomić was closely tied to Milošević. A 2000 report by Germany's

Federal Intelligence Service The Federal Intelligence Service (, ; BND) is the foreign intelligence agency of Germany, directly subordinate to the Chancellor's Office. The BND headquarters is located in central Berlin. The BND has 300 locations in Germany and foreign cou ...

alleged that Milošević essentially ran a criminal operation, particularly after the 1992

sanctions on Yugoslavia During the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s and early 2000s, several rounds of international sanctions were imposed against the former Yugoslav republics of Serbia and Montenegro that formed a new country called the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. San ...

caused "massive smuggling operations...controlled by Milošević and his cronies, who made vast profits from it"; Tomić was named as one of those cronies. Under Milošević's regime, Tomić led Jugopetrol when "fuel-smuggling was a multi-million dollar business", and "reportedly profited handsomely from the illicit oil that flowed into Serbia during sanctions". Serbian mobster and paramilitary leader

Arkan Željko Ražnatović (, ; 17 April 1952 – 15 January 2000), better known as Arkan (), was a Serbian warlord, mobster and head of the Serb paramilitary force called the Serb Volunteer Guard during the Yugoslav Wars, considered one of the most f ...

gave Tomić a medal because he had provided gasoline for Arkan's

Serb Volunteer Guard The Serb Volunteer Guard, SDG. Also known as Arkan's Tigers () or Arkan's men (). was an elite Serbian volunteer paramilitary unit founded and led by Željko Ražnatović (better known as "Arkan"). It was recognized for its superior bearing an ...

, a paramilitary unit suspected of war crimes and ethnic cleansing.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tomic, Dragan 1935 births 2022 deaths People from Zenica-Doboj Canton Kosovo Serbs Socialist Party of Serbia politicians Presidents of the National Assembly (Serbia) Presidents of Serbia within Yugoslavia Socialist People's Party (Serbia) politicians Members of the Central Committee of the 13th Congress of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia Candidates for President of Serbia