ZAGREB, 17 July 2022 - Croatians consider television and radio as the most trustful sources of information, and their trust in information on social networks is higher than the EU average, a Eurobarometer survey shows.

The survey examined media habits, trust in different media sources, and attitudes towards disinformation, the Croatian Ministry of Culture and Media says in a presentation of the Eurobarometer findings on its website. 

Media outlets play a major role in informing citizens about the European Union's activities and its institutions. This survey shows that 72% of respondents say that they have recently read, seen or heard something about the European Union and 57% about the European Parliament.

In Croatia, 86% of respondents have read something about the EU, and 73% about the European Parliament.

In the EU, television dominates as the primary news source (75%), and this is particularly true for older generations. In Croatia too, 75% of respondents cited television as their primary source of information.

Overall, public TV and radio stations are the most trusted news source in the EU (49%), followed by written press (39%) and private TV and radio stations (27%).

In Croatia, public TV and radio stations are the most trusted news source for 39% of those polled, while written press is cited by 26%, and private TV and radio stations by 23%.

Interestingly, 19% of those polled in Croatia trust information on social networks, as against 14% in the whole of the EU.

As many as 12% of respondents in the EU and in Croatia feel "very confident" that they can recognise disinformation and fake news, and 52% in the EU and 56% in Croatia feel "somewhat confident". The level of confidence in distinguishing between real news and fake news decreases with age and increases with level of education.

Ipsos European Public Affairs interviewed a representative sample of EU citizens, aged 15 years and over, in each of the 27 Member States of the European Union. Between 26 April and 11 May 2022, 53 347 interviews were completed via computer-assisted web interviewing, using Ipsos online panels and their partner network, the European Parliament said on its website.

The EU results are weighted according to the size of the population in each country.

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June 27, 2022 - You see them on the street, you see them on your bills, and you hear them on the phone. Who is who among the Croatian public services and institutions? We'll tell you more in this short guide.

If moving to Croatia is one of your short-term projects, or even if you're already in the process of adaptation, you may have heard of or been in contact with one of these institutions. These Croatian public services and institutions will be part of your daily life here, and it is true that sometimes it can be a bit confusing trying to distinguish them from each other.

In this short guide, we've listed some of the Croatian public services and institutions that you will be in contact with most often, and we hope that this will help you when you don't know where to go for a certain task, or when it's time to do your accounts at home.

MUP

If you're working on getting your residency or citizenship in Croatia, you have most likely gone to a local MUP office. It's also likely that they've called you on the phone or have written you an email or two. MUP is the Ministry of the Interior, and it provides services to both locals and foreigners alike. At MUP, you will also carry out procedures to obtain your passport, your driver's license, your Croatian identification card, and more.

HZZO 

HZZO is the Croatian Health Insurance Fund, it's part of the Ministry of the Health and it includes everything that is related to public health insurance services in the country. As you well know, public health insurance is mandatory if you reside in Croatia. If you wish to enroll in the Croatian public health system, you must go to the HZZO offices in your city of residence. There you can also find out everything related to your health coverage, sign up with a family doctor, and more.

HZZ

HZZ is the Croatian Employment Office, and it serves to report your current employment status, whether you've found a job or if you don't currently have one. At the Employment Office, you can also find job openings that match your skills. 

HZMO

The Croatian Pension Insurance Institute (HZMO) is a public institution that is dedicated to the implementation of mandatory pension insurance based on generational solidarity (1st pillar of the pension insurance) and the child benefit entitlement procedure.

Porezna uprava

Porezna uprava is the Croatian Tax Administration, and it's a unique and independent administrative organisation within the Finance Ministry whose basic task is the application and supervision of tax regulations and laws on the collection of contributions. Most of your bills will be issued by Porezna uprava. They'll also issue you with tax rebates.

FINA

FINA, the Financial Agency, is a leading Croatian company in the field of financial and electronic service provision. Although state-owned, Fina operates exclusively on a market basis and cooperates with banks, the Croatian National Bank, numerous business systems, and other similar entities. A multitude of payments can be paid at their offices.

Hrvatska Pošta

Hrvatska Pošta is the Croatian Post Office, and it has locations in every city and town across the country. In addition to being the place where you can send letters and packages throughout the country and even abroad, it's also the place where you can pay for your phone, electricity, water, health insurance, and more.

HEP

A state-owned company, HEP is the Croatian Electricity Company and it is the only energy entity authorised to provide a public electricity supply in the Republic of Croatia. It also performs the activities of electricity production and heat production for central heating systems, in addition to the management, maintenance, construction, and development of the electricity distribution network.

HAC 

Hrvatske autoceste or Croatian Motorways Ltd is a Croatian state-owned limited liability company tasked with the management, construction, and maintenance of motorways in Croatia.

HRT

Croatian Radio and Television (HRT) performs the activity of providing public broadcasting services. On their radio and television channels, they dedicate themselves to the dissemination of news, information, culture and other related content. Even if you don't watch their channels or listen to their radio stations, a bill of 80 kuna from HRT will always arrive at your home.

For more, check out our lifestyle section.

June 9, 2022 - The first 9 rounds of the 2022/23 Croatian First League season have been announced, as well as that Croatia's most popular football league is returning to HRT after 11 years. 

The draw to reveal the matches for the new Croatian First League (HNL) competition season was held at the Croatian Football Federation premises in Zagreb. The draw decided that in the first round, Istra 1961 - Hajduk, Varaždin - Slaven Belupo, Dinamo - Lokomotiva, Osijek - Gorica, and Šibenik - Rijeka will play.

The first game of the first round is scheduled for July 16, and the first big derby of Croatian sport will be played in the 5th round when Dinamo welcomes Hajduk at Maksimir. 

Hajduk and Dinamo will open the new competition season with the Super Cup match in Zagreb on July 9. The exact dates and times for each round will be added when they are defined. 

Schedule (so far)

1. Round (15. – 17.7.): Istra – Hajduk, Varaždin – Slaven, Dinamo – Lokomotiva, Osijek – Gorica, Šibenik – Rijeka

2. Round (22. – 24.7): Hajduk – Rijeka, Gorica – Šibenik, Lokomotiva – Osijek, Slaven – Dinamo, Istra – Varaždin

3. Round (29. – 31.7.): Varaždin – Hajduk, Dinamo – Istra, Osijek – Slaven, Šibenik – Lokomotiva, Rijeka - Gorica

4. Round (5.-7.8.): Hajduk – Gorica, Lokomotiva – Rijeka, Slaven – Šibenik, Istra – Osijek, Varaždin - Dinamo

5. Round (12. – 14.8.): Dinamo – Hajduk, Osijek – Varaždin, Šibenik – Istra, Rijeka – Slaven, Gorica – Lokomotiva

6. Round (19. – 21.8.): Hajduk – Lokomotiva, Slaven – Gorica, Istra – Rijeka, Varaždin – Šibenik, Dinamo – Osijek

7. Round (26. – 28.8): Osijek – Hajduk, Šibenik – Dinamo, Rijeka – Varaždin, Gorica – Istra, Lokomotiva – Šibenik

8. Round (2. – 4.9.): Hajduk – Slaven, Istra – Lokomotiva, Varaždin – Gorica, Dinamo – Rijeka, Osijek – Šibenik

9. Round (9. – 11.9): Šibenik – Hajduk, Rijeka – Osijek, Gorica – Dinamo, Lokomotiva – Varaždin, Slaven - Istra

Furthermore, it was announced yesterday that HNL is returning to HRT. After an 11-year hiatus, live broadcasts of the Croatian Football League are returning to the public service program. This is the result of an agreement between Hrvatski Telekom and Hrvatska radiotelevizija.

The four-year contract guarantees broadcasts of 27 games per season that will be available to all citizens of the Republic of Croatia. It is a total of 108 matches thanks to which the HNL will have a wider reach.

"First of all, we are happy and satisfied that an agreement has been reached between Hrvatski Telekom and Hrvatska radiotelevizija and that HNL is returning to national television. This is good for Croatian clubs and fans. In the historic contract we signed, one of the main items was for the HNL to return to national television, so we are especially happy about that. I am sure that the people who will work on this HRT project will provide our viewers with a good program," said Marijan Kustić, president of the Croatian Football Federation.

Although we have been following the domestic league through sports and news programs, this contract will bring added value to public television, but also to football fans. The show "Stadium" also moves forward this summer, from the first round of the championship, in its current term on Monday night at 8 pm, and with the beginning of autumn, on Sunday at 9 pm, immediately after the end of the last match of the round. This will enable the HRT Sports Program to give its viewers a quick and high-quality overview of all the interesting things that domestic football has to offer.

"Yes, Stadium will follow our domestic football from the beginning of the championship, and the broadcasts will arrive in mid-September when our autumn program starts. Sunday at 3 pm will be our regular term, the term of domestic football on our Second Program. We have 27 games under contract, including four derby matches. We have provided good picks, as a national house we must provide everyone with a television broadcast. I believe that at the end of the story, everyone will be satisfied," said Marko Šapit from the Sports Department of HRT.

For more, make sure to check out our dedicated sports section. 

ZAGREB, 24 March 2022 - Zadar County Court has rejected an appeal by the HRT public broadcaster against reporter Hrvoje Zovko and upheld a Zagreb Municipal Court ruling that the statement by Zovko, who is president of the Croatian Journalists' Association, about censorship at HRT was not contentious or false.

The court also ruled that Zovko's statement did not hurt the HRT's reputation, the HND reported on its website on Thursday.

"This is a great victory for me, my family and my attorney and proof that I have been telling the truth all along," said Zovko.

He said the final ruling in the case was also a "defeat of the policy pursued by the public media service at the time when Kazimir Bačić, a former inmate of the Remetinac jail, was at its helm" and when all the lawsuits against him were filed.

"This is a great victory for HND and the journalist profession. The ruling confirms the real situation at the HRT's News Desk, which is something we have been warning of for years," said Zovko.

The ruling notes that Zovko made statements that HRT considers contentious after the broadcaster fired him and that HRT was the first to go public about the dismissal. Zovko's statements were a reaction to HRT's public statement about the reasons for his dismissal, the court ruled.

The court also found that the motive for Zovko to make the statements was determined correctly and that the statements were a justified response to ill-intentioned attempts to publicly discredit him.

The court ruled that testimonies by witnesses for the defence were convincing and sincere.

The court further determined that the working atmosphere and environment at HRT had for a long time prior to Zovko's statements been such that it could prompt a large number of persons, including the indictee, to conclude that there was a certain degree of restriction on employees to freely express their opinions and ideas.

Politics: For more, check out our politics section.

ZAGREB, 16 March 2022 - HRT director-general Robert Šveb on Wednesday decided to appoint Rahela Štefanović the editor-in-chief of the national broadcaster's television channels HTV1, HTV2, HTV3, HTV4 and its international channel.

Štefanović's appointment followed after 79.78% of the editors, journalists and photo-journalists of the HRT who participated in a non-binding advisory vote supported her nomination.

There are 1,356 journalists and staffers eligible to take part in this kind of vote, and 178 or 13.13% participated in it.

Štefanović will succeed Bruno Kovačević on 21 March.

Business: For more, check out our business section.

ZAGREB, 20 Nov, 2021 - Protesters against COVID-19 certificates on Saturday evening moved from Zagreb's central square to the part of the city where the HRT public broadcaster is located, demanding to see the HRT director and have their rally covered live and calling for an end to "censorship" by the HRT.

Dissatisfied with the way the HRT covered their protest in the central city square at 3 p.m., the protesters shouted "We want elections", "Referendum and people's rule", "Thieves", "Treason", "God's law is above all laws", demanding to see the HRT director and have their rally covered live.

The protesters were met by riot police, with a dozen police vehicles blocking access to the HRT building.

Some of the protesters demanded to see the editor in chief and that the protest be broadcast live, claiming that the HRT "cannot be a factory of censorship" and that "the HRT is lying to the Croatian people, spreading fear and enemy propaganda."

Claiming that they did not want to force anything on anyone and did not want others to do it to them, and shouting "We want truth" and "People rules" and singing patriotic songs, they continued to demand a response by the HRT, saying that "people want to say what they think" and the public broadcaster has the duty to report about it.

"This is no vaccine, this is poison", someone in the crowd could be heard saying while some protesters said the world was ruled by "Bill Gates, Talmudists and Soros's followers".

An HRT employee told the protesters that there was no one in the building they could talk to, to which they responded with shouts however the protest continued mostly without incidents and around 8 p.m. the protesters started to disperse.

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ZAGREB, 15 Nov 2021 - The Croatian Journalists Association (HND) on Monday warned that the head of the HRT public broadcaster's "Business operation" unit, Mislav Stipić, has filed a private slander lawsuit against two HND vice-presidents, thus continuing a string of lawsuits against reporters and HND leaders.

Stipić has sued HND vice-presidents Branko Mijić and Goran Gazdek over a statement published on 12 March under the title "Bačić's taking to court leading people of the HND and Croatian Trade Union new attack on media freedoms", the HND said in a statement.

The latest case continues the shameful string of lawsuits against reporters that have made Croatia recognizable in the EU as a country where power-wielders use lawsuits to square accounts with reporters and media, thus threatening journalistic and media freedoms, the HND says, noting that Croatia has been at the bottom of EU rankings with regard to respect for media freedoms.

HND president Hrvoje Zovko said this was yet another attack on the HND by Stipić but the HND would continue speaking and warning about the situation at the HRT as well as his role in it. 

Stipić resented allegations in the said statement that former HRT director Kazimir Bačić, dismissed over corruption charges, targeted anyone who had dared speak up publicly about serious accusations of sexual harassment and mobbing, made against Stipić by an HRT employee and corroborated by two other employees, which Bačić tried to cover up, the HND said.

For more on politics, follow TCN's dedicated page.

September 19, 2021 - HRT confirms Croatia's participation in the Eurovision Song Contest 2022. The selection of Croatia's entry for Italy will once again be crowned through the Dora competition.

Croatia is again getting ready for the 66th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest and is undeniably in high spirits. As HRT recently posted, “The beautiful September weather only contributes to the preparations for Dora and Eurovision 2022, which are in full swing! The Croatian national final for the Eurovision Song Contest will begin soon, so stay with us for more information.”

Since the country's debut in 1993, Dora has been used to select Croatia's entry for Eurovision except between 2012 to 2018 when Croatia had undergone a series of internal selections and withdrawals. In 2019, Dora returned and has been used ever since. 

According to Eurovoix, Dora 2022 is expected to take place in Opatija. The city has hosted all editions of the show except in 2011. Opatija and HRT signed a three-year deal to host Glazbeni Dani Hrvatske Radiotelevizije, which Dora is a part of.

Last year, Albina was chosen to represent Croatia in the 2021 Eurovision Song Contest with the song "Tick-Tock". With the votes of the jury and public, the song made it in the top ten but landed 11th in the semi-final and did not qualify for the finals.

This year's Eurovision Song Contest will take place in Italy on May 22 following their victory with Maneskin's "Zitti e buoni" at the 2021 Eurovision contest. 

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ZAGREB, 14 Sept, 2021 - "NDH", a series of the Croatian Radio Television (HRT) about the Ustasha-ruled Independent State of Croatia, will start on Monday, 20 September and its author, historian Hrvoje Klasić, says it should have been aired much sooner, while the HRT rejects claims about deliberately not broadcasting the series.

"I only know that this series should have been finished much sooner. But it hasn't been. And that was not because of us as the crew, and it should have aired sooner. Again, not because of us, but because of the HRT," Klasić told Hina.

On the other hand, the public broadcaster's acting Director-General, Renato Kunić, said that no show had been deliberately not aired during his term as the director of programming and during his colleagues' terms.

He added that the NDH series was put on hold for several reasons. More specifically, an adequate schedule had to be found for the 12 episodes because that is three months of airing, and the programme budget has its rules, Kunić said.

He also said that the series cost about HRK 1.5 million and that the difference between the six episodes initially proposed by Klasić and the 12 realised episodes was about half a million kuna, and he stressed that this was a matter of assessment when to air the programme and not a ban, adding that the series was finished in June 2020.

Both Klasić and the HRT agreed that this was a long-awaited project in which about 30 members of the academic community and historians would talk about the NDH, and it would be illustrated by over two hours of film material on the NDH, purchased from the Yugoslav Film Archive.

Klasić underlined the valuable contribution of HRT's director and co-writer Miljenko Bukovčan and editor Iva Blašković.

Klasić: Series is neither ideological nor tendentious

"I would like to warn the viewers -- there are 12 episodes and this was not done in an ideological or tendentious way," Klasić said, adding that the series was not chronological but organised thematically.

"Everything that is said is enough to understand that moment -- the temporal, socio-political context, to understand what that state was and what kind of life its citizens had," he said.

The goal was not, he pointed out, to create a lexicon in which everything would be listed, but to give a description and an analysis of a time, and top experts from the entire region and Europe helped with that.

Klasić also explained his statement in Jutarnji List daily that "there are no conflicting opinions, but only because right-wing historians did not want to participate".

"When we talk about the NDH, there are no conflicting opinions among historians and scientists who care about their scientific reputation. Not among scientists in Zagreb, Belgrade, Sweden or in Washington," Klasić said.

Some have merely focused more on a particular period. Of course, there may be different opinions on how to approach the number of victims in Jasenovac or after Bleiburg, he added.

"However, when we talk about the character of the Ustasha-ruled state, the NDH, about the character of the Jasenovac camp or about what happened in May 1945, there is in principle no disagreement," Klasić said.

The series was shot on numerous locations, from the Vatican and Sachsenhausen, to Bleiburg and Jasenovac, Janka Puszta (Jankovac), but also Florence, where there is still the villa which Ustasha leader Ante Pavelić, Klasić said, got for his services in the future annexation of parts of the Croatian Adriatic as Mussolini's "man for special assignments".

Special episodes are dedicated to the economy and culture during the NDH, as well as the relationship between the Ustasha regime and the church.

"A large part of the series focuses on the relationship between the Roman Catholic Church and the Ustasha movement. Many say that the Church used the Ustasha, but I believe that it was vice versa and many historians agree on that. Alojzije Stepinac was not a war criminal but he definitely was not an example of antifascist resistance," said Klasić.

As for possible negative reactions to the series, Klasić said he expected them from those who "have been reviving the NDH for the past 30 years."

"It is to be expected because we live in a country where abnormal things have become normal, including the Ustasha salute, where about 20 streets have been named after members of the Ustasha regime and where there are associations that deny Jasenovac," Klasić said.

For more about politics in Croatia, follow TCN's dedicated page.

ZAGREB, 28 Aug, 2021 - Wreath-laying ceremonies were held on Saturday in Osijek at the "Last Shot" monument erected in memory of HRT cameraman Žarko Kaić, killed by the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) in that eastern Croatian city on 28 August 1991.

Kaic lost his life in the suburb of Brijest when fire was opened from a JNA armoured fighting vehicle at the HRT crew that was covering the passage of a JNA column of tanks through Osijek.

Participants in today's commemoration pointed out that Kaić had been covering the war developments in Slavonia at the start of the Great Serbian aggression.

His work conveyed the truth about the war and the beginning of the Great Serbia aggression, the war veterans ministry's state secretary, Špiro Janović, said at today''s commemorative events.

The truth cannot be interpreted differently, and Kaić's recordings of the events in Osijek, Aljmaš and Dalj show the suffering of the Croatian people and the resolve of Croatian soldiers, Janović said.

In that incident 30 years ago, Kaić was killed while an HRT sound operator, Dragan Krička, was seriously wounded and the third member of the TV crew, journalist Saša Kopljar, remained unwounded.

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