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Franjo Tudjman
Tudjman was expelled from the ruling Communist party in 1967 because of his controversial writings, which were condemned as being anti-Marxist and supportive of Croatian nationalism. In 1972 Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito suppressed the Croatian national movement, and Tudjman was among those arrested. Tudjman served nine months of a two-year sentence. He was tried again in 1981 for nationalist activities and given a three-year sentence. In 1989, as Communist control began to disintegrate in Eastern Europe and Yugoslavia moved toward multiparty elections, Tudjman founded and became president of the Croatian Democratic Union. The party won a plurality of votes and a solid parliamentary majority in Croatia's first multiparty elections in spring 1990. In May 1990 the new parliament elected Tudjman as president of Croatia. Under his leadership, Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia in June 1991. Serbs, both in Croatia and in neighboring Serbia, objected to Croatia's secession and war broke out. In January 1992 Croatia won international recognition of its independence. In elections held under its new constitution, Tudjman was re-elected as Croatia's president in November 1992.Click here to read a good speech from Tudjman. |
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(1922-1999 ), president of
Croatia (1990- ), and leader of Croatia's war of independence from Yugoslavia in
1991. Tudjman was born in Veliko Trgovišce in the Croatian Zagorje region. In
1941 he joined the Communist-led Partisans, a group of resistance fighters
opposed to Axis occupation of Yugoslavia during part of World War II
(1939-1945). After the war, Tudjman held staff positions in the Yugoslav army
and was promoted to general in 1960. He left active service in 1961 to become a
full-time military historian, and later political historian, as the Director of
the Zagreb Institute of the History of the Worker's Movement and professor of
political science at Zagreb University, where he received his doctorate in 1965.