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Vojislav Koštunica [pronounced voy-ees-lahf kosh-TOON-ee-tsa] (born March 24, 1944) is the Prime Minister in the Government
of Serbia and a lawyer from Serbia.
A law graduate from the University of Belgrade, he lost his job in 1974 after
criticizing Tito's Communist government. In 1989, he
became one of the founders of the Democratic
Party. Later he became the leader of the new Democratic Party of Serbia. He is still president of the DSS.
Koštunica was a populist politician with no connection to the old Communist Party (from which Slobodan Milosevic's party originated), supported both by the
"democratic" and the "nationalistic" voters, so the Democratic Opposition of Serbia backed him in the presidential election of September
2000.
After turbulent events of October 2000, Koštunica was finally declared the winner of the election and remained president
of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia until 2003, when the state was replaced by Serbia and Montenegro and the position he held was abolished .
Koštunica opposed the extradition of Slobodan Milosevic,
and has stated his opposition to the Hague Tribunal several times. He also refused to remove Milosevic's former police chief
Rade Markovic from office.
Following the parliamentary elections in December 2003, in which the DSS emerged as the largest of the democratic parties,
Koštunica became prime minister in March 2004 at the head of the new minority government of Serbia with the support of the Socialist Party of Serbia.
Following the bad showing of the government candidate Dragan
Maršićanin in the Serbian presidential elections, 2004, Koštunica announced that fresh
parliamentary elections should be expected by the end of the year just following the adoption of a new Constitution for
Serbia.
Since then the minority government of Vojislav Koštunica has maintained a frail coalition government and most importantly
by being tolerated by the Democratic Party of President Boris Tadic. While dissent over his controversial policy of non
cooperation with the International War Crimes Tribunal in the Hague, is growing within his own coalition (namely by G17 Plus and
SPO), Koštunica is recieving more and more support by what is popularily called "the patriotic front", Serbian Radical Party
(led by the indicted war criminal Vojislav Seselj) and the Socialist Party of Serbia (led by the former President of Yugoslavia
and Serbia Slobodan Milosevic), alongside with independent personalities like Kosta Cavoski, who is acting as a legal counsel to
the wanted Radovan Karadzic as well as Brana Crncevic, a mostly
successful writer who has made a name for himself by riding an ultra-nationalist wave during the reign of Slobodan Milosevic,
which is further weakening the ruling coalition.
Koštunica lives with his wife and fellow lawyer Zorica Radović.
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