Founder and long-time president of the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) Vuk Draskovic he resigned from that position, it was announced on the website of the party founded by Drašković in 1990.
It is stated that Drašković, after more than 30 years at the head of SPO, resigned on July 12, and that the change in the top of the party was registered on August 19 in the register of political parties at the Ministry of State Administration and Local Self-Government. As Drašković's successor, the current director of SPO Aleksandar Cvetković was chosen.
Drašković was born in the Banat village of Međa in 1946 and comes from a family of colonists from Herzegovina.
Journalist and writer
He finished high school in Gacko, and graduated from the Faculty of Law in Belgrade in 1968. From 1969 to 1980, he worked as a journalist in the Tanjug agency, of which he also worked as a correspondent from African countries for almost three years.
He left journalism in 1981, when he devoted himself to writing, and soon after his bestseller "The Judge" was published. Apart from that, among others, he also published the novels "Knife" (1982), which was filmed in 1999, "Prayer" (1985), "Molitva 2" (1986), "The Russian Consul" (1988), which was filmed in 2024. "Night of the Generals" (1994), "Doctor Aaron" (2009) and "Alexander of Yugoslavia" (2018), released in 2021 as a feature film and television series.
Proponent of the restoration of Serbian national values
In the eighties of the 20th century, Drašković was part of the nationally oriented intelligentsia in Serbia. He was among the prominent advocates of multi-partyism, civil and religious freedom, and the restoration of Serbian national values.
In 1989, together with Mirko Jović, he founded the Serbian National Renewal political party in Stara Pazova, but due to opposing views, that party split.
In March 1990, the breakaway wing of the Serbian National Defense, of which Drašković was the president, unites with the Serbian Freedom Movement of Vojislav Šešelj, with whom Drašković has a godfather relationship. From the fall of that year, he broke up with Seselja, and that's when the Serbian Restoration Movement party was born.
"Lord of the Squares"
During the nineties of the last century, he was known and remembered as the "master of the squares" and a prominent speaker. Until the first war conflicts occurred, as the leader of the largest opposition party to the regime of Slobodan Milošević, he strove for the preservation, or confederation, of the former Yugoslavia. He advocated for Yugoslavia, considering it to be the best solution, bearing in mind that it was the only country where all Serbs lived.
In his biography, it is stated that the SPO was at the head of all anti-regime protests: "and March 1991, 1992, and the Vidovdan Assembly in 1993, and the June demonstrations in 1996, and the three-month demonstrations in 1997 and 2000, and the April rally in 2000, and the October uprising of the people in XNUMX." year, as well as many others".
As a monarchist, he advocated the creation of Serbia as a constitutional monarchy with a Serbian army, which would protect the Serbian people and Serbian borders. He admires General Draža Mihailović and the Ravnogorski movement and asked for a historical reconciliation between Serb partisans and Ravnogorsk Serbs.
He insisted that Serbia break ties with the communist past and dismantle the secret services, which were responsible for numerous crimes and political liquidations.
Arrests and two assassinations
In the crackdown against Slobodan Milošević's regime, he was arrested twice, on March 9, 1991 and in June 1993, when he and his wife Danica were sentenced to two months in prison. They were released thanks to the pressure of the international public and mass demonstrations in Serbia.
During the assassination attempt on Drašković on October 3, 1999, on the Ibar highway, four members of the SPO were killed. During the repeated assassination attempt in Budva on June 15, 2000, Drašković was wounded.
When the decade of civil war and disintegration of the SFRY passed, he condemned the war crimes that "compromised the glorious Serbian warrior ideal, achieved in the Great War."
The fall of Milosevic
In January 2000, Drašković and opposition leaders formed an opposition coalition against Milosevic, which was called the Democratic Opposition of Serbia - DOS.
In the summer of 2000, Drašković, on behalf of the party, decided to withdraw from the coalition and SPO appeared independently in the early elections for the president of the FRY, which Milosevic called for September 24 of that year. Drašković's candidate, Vojislav Mihailović, wins a small number of votes, and Vojislav Koštunica defeats Milošević, who at first did not want to admit defeat.
Demonstrations begin throughout Serbia, which ended on October 5 when Milosevic finally admitted defeat and handed over power. Drašković supported the protests and welcomed the change of government.
Drašković was in the Council of Ministers of Serbia and Montenegro since April 2004 as Minister of Foreign Affairs of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. After the termination of the existence of that community, Drašković remains in the same position at the level of Serbia until the election of the new Government in May 2007.
