Passport holders are unwelcome in Serbia - this is the message progressive authorities in recent weeks.
Thus, the state institutions, which have been until now, are being targeted exiled at least 16 Croatian citizens because they suddenly represent a risk for the security situation in Serbia, Croatian manager Nikola Francetić also found.
He received a decision from the Serbian MUP to revoke his work permit in Serbia and ordered him to leave the country within seven days. Francetic's lawyers from Zdenko Tomanović's office filed an appeal with the Administrative Court the very next day and managed to get a postponement of the decision, "Vreme" learns.
"In the case of Nikola Francetić, both the facts and the law, both domestic and international, are on his side, and on the side of the MUP there is arbitrariness and illegality," lawyer Senja Savić from the Tomanović law office explains to "Vreme". "He is encouraged by the action of the Administrative Court, which very quickly made a decision approving our request."
After this decision of the Administrative Court, Savić adds, Francetić still proved to be acceptable to security and he can stay freely in Serbia until the decision on the appeal is made. However, the question is how this high-ranking manager will continue to live without fear in the country - which he knows has tried to expel him.
Key referee and secret risk
Francetic's lawyers appealed the decision to leave Serbia in a week, first to the MUP, and then to the Administrative Court because the MUP did not respond.
It turned out that judge Vesna Danilović dared and approved that the Croatian manager can stay in Serbia until the end of the proceedings, regardless of the fact that she knew that her decision like this would not be viewed favorably by the top of the progressive government and the BIA.
At the end of 2024, she told Radar that "judges who hold to their integrity, independence and impartiality are harassed, humiliated as the worst and labeled as a problem in the court, and if they persist in their independent attitude, then they are also persecuted in subtle or direct ways, for example by being buried with cases and criticism".
In the meantime, Francetic traveled to Croatia in order not to get in trouble with the Serbian police, who could eventually arrest and deport him.
Also, the acts by which he, as well as other Croatian citizens, were declared a threat, were marked as secret.
"It is legally inadmissible that a person to whom the state collects taxes, both on the basis of ownership of real estate and on the basis of work, suddenly, for unknown reasons, the police declares to be unacceptable for security reasons and at the same time does not give a single reason for such a claim," adds Savić.
"Worked for Vučić's enemy"
Nikola Francetić lived in Belgrade for the last seven years and worked as the director of the television platform NetTV Plus, popularly called a program for guest workers. which was part of the United Group. As soon as it passed into the hands of Telekom Serbia, it changed its own appearance and offer, so citizens abroad could no longer watch N1 and Nova S.
"He worked in the leading Croatian media and telecoms, and then in Belgrade for seven years in the company of Vučić's enemy," writes the Croatian "Jutarnji list" about Francetić, for which the manager also gave a statement.
Seven days after he practically became an employee of Telekom, he was called by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Serbia, where he was ordered to leave the country.
"I was in Belgrade for seven years, I worked, I made friends, I never had any problems. And then I got a call from the police, the directorate for foreigners," he told "Jutarnji list".
Radical maneuvers
The authorities did not come up with the idea of expelling Croatian citizens on their own. She already remembered Seselj's maneuver, when in 1992 the Serbian Radical Party held a pre-election rally in Hrtkovci in front of more than a thousand people, where Vojislav Seselj called for the expulsion of the local Croatian population.
"The essence is the government's desire to get votes. Their goal is to stay in power and they stop at nothing to achieve that goal. I don't know if the justification of violence is intentional or a side effect, but it happens," he told new issue of "Vremen" Professor of the Faculty of Philosophy, Oliver Tošković.
"Anyone who thinks differently is a terrorist. People attack each other at festivals, there are families that are divided over whether their child will support their strike at school or not. The division that begins to tear families apart, as the basis of a society, is the most terrible thing in all of this," he says.
"When you have such a divided society, there is dehumanization and justification of violence. All this damages society in the long term and it will take a long time to heal it," concludes the interlocutor of "Vremena".
It's not the first time, not this year either.
This method of expelling Croatian citizens threatens to become a practice.
Thus, the participants of the workshops of the organization "Erste Stiftung" expelled from Serbia in January 2025, with the explanation that they threaten the security of the state and citizens. In the decision that was issued to them as a reason for deportation, the "protection of the security of the Republic of Serbia and its citizens" was stated.
"Time" was written and the Croatian citizen Arien Stojanović Ivković, who was expelled by the Serbian authorities after 12 years of peaceful life and separated from her family.
Expelled young doctor, marked as a high-risk security factor. She worked in an insurance company on the assessment of damages caused by bodily injuries. Her life was reduced to, as she said herself, work, kindergarten, child, family and going to some - student protest.
