Ivo Pukanić (21 January 1961 – 23 October 2008) was a

Croatia Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country in Central Europe, Central and Southeast Europe, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. It borders Slovenia to the northwest, Hungary to the northeast, Serbia to the east, Bosnia and Herze ...

journalist A journalist is a person who gathers information in the form of text, audio or pictures, processes it into a newsworthy form and disseminates it to the public. This is called journalism. Roles Journalists can work in broadcast, print, advertis ...

. He was best known as

editor-in-chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The editor-in-chief heads all departments of the organization and is held accoun ...

of the once influential Croatian political weekly '' Nacional''. In 2008, Pukanić was assassinated by members of Serbian organized crime groups.

Life and career

Pukanić was born in

Zagreb Zagreb ( ) is the capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Croatia#List of cities and towns, largest city of Croatia. It is in the Northern Croatia, north of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the ...

. He graduated from the Faculty of

Political Science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and Power (social and political), power, and the analysis of political activities, political philosophy, political thought, polit ...

at the

University of Zagreb The University of Zagreb (, ) is a public university, public research university in Zagreb, Croatia. It is the largest Croatian university and one of the oldest continuously operating universities in Europe. The University of Zagreb and the Unive ...

in 1983, after which he started working for

Vjesnik ''Vjesnik'' () was a Croatian state-owned daily newspaper published in Zagreb. Originally established in 1940 as a wartime illegal publication of the Communist Party of Croatia, it later built and maintained a reputation as Croatia's newspaper ...

publishing house as a

photographer A photographer (the Greek φῶς (''phos''), meaning "light", and γραφή (''graphê''), meaning "drawing, writing", together meaning "drawing with light") is a person who uses a camera to make photographs. Duties and types of photograp ...

for two of their weekly

magazine A magazine is a periodical literature, periodical publication, print or digital, produced on a regular schedule, that contains any of a variety of subject-oriented textual and visual content (media), content forms. Magazines are generally fin ...

s, ''Start'' and ''Studio''. In 1992 he started his career as a journalist and editor at the popular weekly '' Globus'' published by Europapress Holding. He left ''Globus'' only three years later in 1995 to start his own weekly publication, '' Nacional'', where he held the post of editor-in-chief until 2000. That same year Pukanić received an award from Croatian Journalists' Association. He also later received an award for a 2003 interview with army general Ante Gotovina, who was at the time on the run due to accusations of

war crimes A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hos ...

by the ICTY.

Assassination

Pukanić was assassinated on October 23, 2008, at 6.10 p.m. local time by a

bomb A bomb is an explosive weapon that uses the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations inflict damage principally through ground- and atmosphere-transmitted mechan ...

planted on a

motorcycle A motorcycle (motorbike, bike; uni (if one-wheeled); trike (if three-wheeled); quad (if four-wheeled)) is a lightweight private 1-to-2 passenger personal motor vehicle Steering, steered by a Motorcycle handlebar, handlebar from a saddle-style ...

parked next to his Lexus LS600hL in the center of

, the capital of

. He was killed alongside Niko Franjić, the ''Nacional'' marketing manager. The incident happened in Stara Vlaška Street, only two street blocks east of Ban Jelačić Square, the central square of Zagreb. It was caught on

CCTV Closed-circuit television (CCTV), also known as video surveillance, is the use of closed-circuit television cameras to transmit a signal to a specific place on a limited set of monitors. It differs from broadcast television in that the signa ...

, with the footage showing the explosion moments before Pukanić and Franjić were about to enter the vehicle. ''Nacional'' reporter Plamenko Cvitić was the first news reporter on the scene. The police immediately blocked the traffic around the site of assassination, causing immense traffic jams all over the city center. Prime Minister Ivo Sanader declined a proposal for entering a

state of emergency A state of emergency is a situation in which a government is empowered to put through policies that it would normally not be permitted to do, for the safety and protection of its citizens. A government can declare such a state before, during, o ...

.Special report on Nova TV (October 23, 2008) Eight people, suspected of having connections to organised crime groups, were indicted. Six were later convicted over Pukanić's murder with prison terms ranging from 15 to 40 years. Pukanić was survived by his wife, Mirjana, and daughter, Sara (born c. 1991).

References

External links

Killing the Journalist or: Sreten Jocic alias Joca Amsterdam – The bloody journey of a Mafia boss across Europe
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pukanic, Ivo 1961 births 2008 deaths Assassinated newspaper editors Journalists from Zagreb Investigative journalists Deaths by car bomb Assassinated Croatian journalists People murdered in Croatia People murdered by Serbian organized crime Faculty of Political Sciences, University of Zagreb alumni 20th-century Croatian journalists People assassinated in the 21st century