When journalism became a dangerous profession — Kosovo 2.0
“If a journalist is killed, it means that the parallel state has taken over, or even worse.”
Karaivaz was the 14th journalist to be killed in Europe since the start of 2017. Many more have been intimidated, threatened and attacked, because of their work and dedication to the public.
“The authorities pose a greater threat than the criminal organizations,” explains Jovanović, who knows quite a bit about how dangerous it is to be a journalist in Serbia.
Examples from other countries, including some EU member states, are showing a similar picture.
Targeted threats
However, this has not stopped KRIK from becoming one of the most prominent media organizations in the Balkans, with multiple awards, not only from Serbia but also internationally. Since 2015, KRIK has also been part of the network, which aims to “expose and explain the relationship between money and power” across the world.
Bojana Jovanović was one of a number of colleagues who launched KRIK six years ago believing that the public needs the media to expose the “suspicious and corrupt practices of leaders, their links with people from organized criminal organizations and misuse of state budgets.”
Each of these stories made KRIK and its journalists more vulnerable, but also more determined to continue investigating. Nevertheless, it became more difficult not only due to the threats, but also due to limited access to what should be public information.
“Government officials whose assets we have investigated do not agree to be interviewed; they do not want to answer our questions at press conferences, they avoid journalists, or even attack us,” Jovanović explains.
But despite the pressures, KRIK keeps reporting, no matter what.
Dojčinović has also written a on the “Balkan Drug King” Darko Šarić , who was arrested in South America in 2014 and extradited to Serbia. In 2018, Šarić was , with his associates, to 15 years in prison for cocaine smuggling.
According to media reports, over 50 people have died in this war for influence and revenge popularly referred to as the “Montenegrin clan war.”
The war against KRIK
In 2016, Serbia’s minister of the interior announced an official clampdown on the mafia. KRIK’s Dojčinović has said that the subsequent indictments from the Serbian courts were an intentional attempt to weaken the Škaljari clan with arrests and prosecutions, with KRIK’s investigations having shown that the Kavač clan has links to the Serbian political leadership, and even to Vučić’s son . Their reporting on this exposed KRIK journalists to additional pressure.
“We have been labeled criminals, enemies of the authorities, foreign mercenaries and spies,” Jovanović recalls.
The defamation campaign based on disinformation and fake news was supported by some members of the ruling SNS party . During a parliamentary session in March 2021, MPs Sandra Božić and Vladimir Orlić both claimed that KRIK cooperated with organized crime groups.
According to Jovanović, the goal of the campaign against KRIK was to stop them from investigating corruption and criminal connections between government officials.
Unfortunately, fighting these types of smear campaigns has become part of their work for KRIK journalists over the past few years.
“The pro-government media operates under the dictatorship of the authorities,” Jovanović says. “It would be difficult to say that this kind of reporting has anything to do with journalism.”
A journalist killed in Athens
Matthaios Tsimitakis, a journalist and former communications officer for Alex Tsipiras during his time as Greek prime minister, told K2.0 that Karaivaz used to report on organized crime in Greece “which was gaining more influence in the country by corrupting officials, including the police.”
“Contrary to other professionals in his field, he didn’t have the reputation of someone who acts like a spokesperson for the police,” Tsimitakis says. “That gained him respect both inside the police as well as with the journalist community. But it also made him enemies among a few corrupt police officers and organized crime groups.”
Karaivaz’s murder even shook the European Commission. Vera Jourova, commissioner for values and transparency, tweeted the same day : “I am deeply shocked following reports that journalist Giorgos Karaivaz was shot dead in Athens.”
“In 2016 to 2018 Karaivaz covered a series of homicides, part of a local mafia war in Athens, and he didn’t hesitate to reveal names publicly, to talk about the role of each and every actor, including corrupt policemen and criminals with ties to the political system,” Tsimitakis recalls.
In one of his last reports , Karaivaz had been investigating the case of Menios Fourthiotis, a minor conservative TV presenter who has links to the leading political party , New Democracy. Fourthiotis has subsequently been implicated in a fraud scandal and has been accused of having links to organized crime .
Just two days before Karaivaz’s murder, Documento editor-in-chief Vaxevanis was contacted by a source who said that Fourthiotis was planning a plot to “kill him [Vaxevanis] and one other journalist.”
Corrupt police and a war between crime groups
Tsimitakis wonders whether Karaivaz’s murder shows not only an attack on the press, but could reveal other issues in the future.
The Greek organized crime world is similar right now to that of Montenegro and Serbia; waging a war for dominance that started four years ago and is counting victims monthly. Since Karavaiz’s death in April three other people have been killed in similar circumstances in Athens.
But many international groups have also moved to Greece or at least showed their presence in recent years. Some names are already familiar to the Serbian public due to KRIK’s reporting.
In January 2020 two members of the Montenegrin so-called Škaljari Clan, were shot dead in Athens while dining with their families. Six months later two more members of the same gang were executed while spending time on the Greek island of Corfu. During the investigation police that between 10 and 15 people from the Balkans directly connected with the Škaljari-Kavač dispute had found shelter in Greece.
While organized crime groups continue their conflict, police investigations into those crimes show no results, and journalists’ lives remain under threat.
“Reporting on organized crime is a dangerous job in any country,” Tsimitakis says. “Karaivaz was one of the very few people that had managed to enter the world of organized crime and actually report about it in detail.”
The deaths of Ján Kuciak and Martina Kusnirova
At the end of February 2018, 27-year-old journalist J á n Kuciak and his fiancee, archaeologist Martina Kusnirova, were shot dead in their home in Velka Maca, close to the Slovakian capital, Bratislava.
“J á n Kuciak was a very talented investigative journalist,” says Lukas Diko, the former director of news at RTV Slovakia and now e ditor-in-chief at the Ján Kuciak Investigative Center (ICJK).
Diko explains that after the murder, Slovakian society found itself “in a state of horror and shock.”
As a result, three weeks later, Fico , and two years after that, in March 2020, his Social Democrat party lost the , with voters giving an opportunity to anti-corruption activist and populist Igor Matovi č .
“People who were untouchable before were arrested and charged with money laundering and corruption,” says Diko as he talks about what he calls “the transformation of the judicial system.”
But, he stresses, the downfall of criminal groups and prosecution of top officials does not mean that Slovak journalists are working peacefully and undisturbed.
“The biggest problem for journalists in Slovakia now is political pressure and insults coming from different high-ranking politicians,” Diko says.
Shelter for international organized crime
According to a State Department report from 2014, Slovakia “was a transit destination country for counterfeit and smuggled goods, auto theft, value-added tax fraud, and trafficking in persons, weapons, and illegal drugs run by domestic and foreign organized crime.”
Ongoing investigations and trials are exposing the public details of the connections between former state structures in Slovakia and organized crime.
In April 2020, former soldier Miroslav Mar č ek was jailed for 23 years after admitting to carrying out the killings of J á n Kuciak and Martina Kusnirova, while two suspects were jailed for facilitating the attack. Marian Kočner, who was accused of masterminding the attack, and an alleged co-conspirator were acquitted by the first instance court. The Slovak Supreme Court will make a final judgment on the double murder case on June 15, 2021.
Journalists in Slovakia are not giving up. In order to provide protection for each other, but also to talk about difficulties they face during their work, they have been cooperating across newsrooms in a project connected to the murder investigation called “Kočner’s Library,” under the coordination of ICJK.
“This cooperation is unique; journalists from competing media have been cooperating,” Diko explains. “That helps them feel secure, and together they have more analytical power.”
Journalists in Greece, Serbia and Slovakia have learned this lesson the hard way.
Feature image: Katja Lihtenvalner.
Originally published at https://kosovotwopointzero.com on June 10, 2021.
