Nenad Kulačin, the host of the Good, Bad, Evil (Dobar, Loš, Zao) podcast in Serbia, who is also a columnist for the Belgrade daily Danas, has once again become the target of threats, with the latest threat sent via social media from an anonymous account.
Kulačin has reported eight threats to the Serbian state prosecutor’s office this year, with only one decision made to dismiss a criminal complaint to date, while other cases remain under the prosecutor’s purview. Some of these threats have targeted his colleague journalist and writer Marko Vidojković and Kulačin family members. The most recent threat was received through an anonymous social media account, containing insults and references to Kulačin hometown and brother.
Threats follow a pattern of ongoing intimidation. In 2021 mother of Kulačin was verbally attacked in Bor, a town in Serbia, where an individual allegedly told he that her son should have been hanged. Some media have run smear campaigns against Kulačin. Unknown individuals even posted flyers displaying the home address of Kulačin in Belgrade, Serbia.
Nenad Kulačin and Marko Vidojković, the hosts of the satirical podcast ‘Good, Bad, Evil,’ have faced persistent threats due to their work. These threats are not limited to anonymous individuals. Both Marko Vidojković and Nenad Kulačin have been targets of threats in Serbia for many years. After a series of online death threats, Marko Vidojković and his wife were displaced in the first half of this year with support from PEN International to an unknown location outside of Serbia.
These repeated threats and the lack of action by state institutions, combined with smear campaigns and public threats by some politicians, create a hostile environment where attacks on government critics are normalized and encouraged. This situation has a severe chilling effect on free speech and independent reporting.
The South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO) expressed deep concern about the increasing threats against Kulačin and is asking the Serbian police to react, investigate the case, and protect Kulačin, Marko Vidojković, and Kulačin family members. SEEMO calls on Serbian authorities and leading politicians in the country to condemn these threats.
South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO) is a regional non-governmental, non-profit network of editors, media executives and leading journalists in Southeast, South, East and Central Europe. SEEMO members are in Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Moldova (with the territory of Transdnestria), Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Türkiye / Turkey, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. Austria, Italy, Vatican and San Marino have a special status in SEEMO. SEEMO has over 3000 individual members, and additional media as corporate members.
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