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Zoran Milanović
10th Prime Minister of Croatia
Incumbent
Assumed office 23 December 2011
President	Ivo Josipović
Deputy	Radimir Čačić Milanka Opačić Neven Mimica Branko Grčić
Preceded by	Jadranka Kosor
Leader of the Opposition
In office 2 June 2007 – 23 December 2011
Prime Minister	Ivo Sanader Jadranka Kosor
Preceded by	Željka Antunović (Acting)
Succeeded by	Jadranka Kosor
2nd President of the Social Democratic Party
Incumbent
Assumed office 2 June 2007
Deputy	Zlatko Komadina Milanka Opačić
Preceded by	Željka Antunović (Acting)
Member of Parliament
In office 11 January 2008 – 22 December 2011
Prime Minister	Ivo Sanader (until 2009)Jadranka Kosor
Constituency	I electoral district
Personal details
Born	(1966-10-30) 30 October 1966 (age 58) Zagreb, Yugoslavia (now Croatia)
Political party	Social Democratic Party
Spouse	Sanja Musić-Milanović
Children	Ante Marko
Alma mater	University of Zagreb
Occupation	Civil servant

Zoran Milanović (pronounced [zǒran milǎːnoʋitɕ]; born 30 October 1966) is a Croatian politician, leader of the centre-left Social Democratic Party of Croatia (SDP) and the current Prime Minister of Croatia, having taken office on December 23, 2011.

Early life

His father Stipe and mother Gina have roots in Sinj. Zoran has a brother named Krešimir. He attended the Center for Management and Judiciary (an elite high-school). By his own admission, he was ve ery lively and prone to fighting. In 1986, he entered the University of Zagreb in Judiciary. Apart from his native Croatian, he speaks English, French and Russian.

After college, he became an intern at the Croatian Trade Court, and in 1993 got a job in the Croatian Foreign Ministry, being accepted by future political rival Ivo Sanader. A year later, he went to Nagorno-Karabakh as part of a United Nations peace mission.

In 1994, he married Sanja Musić with whom he later had two sons, Ante and Marko. In 1996, he became an advisor at Croatian mission to the European Union and NATO at Brussels. He returned to the Foreign Ministry in 1999, at the end of his mandate.

Career

In 1999, he enrolled in the Social Democratic Party (SDP) as he had not yet been an official member. Following SDP's win in the 2000 elections, he was given responsibility for liaison with NATO, three years later he became assistant to Foreign Minister Tonino Picula. He left his post after the 2003 elections when the conservative HDZ were reelected.

He was elected to SDP's Chief Committee in 2004. Two years later, he briefly became party spokesman, standing in for absent Gordana Grbić. He was also elected coordinator for the IV. election area for the upcoming 2007 elections.

An extraordinary Party convention was held in Zagreb on 2 June 2007, due to the 11 April resignation of the first Party President and Croatia's former Prime Minister Ivica Račan. Milanović entered the contest, despite being considered an "outsider", because of his shorter term in the party, running against Željka Antunović (acting Party President since Račan's resignation), Milan Bandić and Tonino Picula. On 29 September 2007, during the campaign for party president, he publicly promised to resign and never to seek presidency of the party again, if party didn't win more seats that HDZ in next elections. In the first round he led with 592, well ahead of his nearest rival Željka Antunović. In the second round, he faced Antunović and again won by a large margin, thereby becoming president of the party.

Milanović caused a stir in the papers when he stated that Josip Broz Tito was a more positive and overall better politician than Franjo Tuđman.

In September 2008, Milanović made a highly-publicized visit to Bleiburg, Austria to commemorate the Bleiburg massacre. This made him the second leader of the Social Democratic Party of Croatia to visit the site, the first being Ivica Račan.

Parliamentary Elections

The 2007 parliamentary election ended extremely close with SDP winning 56 seats, only 10 mandates short of HDZ's 66 (which included 5 from Croatian diaspora, which was one of the main campaign issues of SDP that promised eliminating the right of vote to those not living in the country). The resulting close race left both sides in a position to form a government, provided they gather 77 of the 153 representatives. After the election, Milanović controversially made himself the candidate for prime minister over Ljubo Jurčić, despite not consulting the party's Main Committee. However the SDP remained in opposition, due to Prime Minister Ivo Sanader forming the majority coalition.

After losing general elections, not only he didn't resign (as he previously promised), but he also again entered elections for president of the party in May 2008. Despite the election loss, Milanović remained the leader of the party receiving the support of the majority of the delegates.

The 2011 parliamentary election saw SDP joining three other left-wing parties to create the media-dubbed Kukuriku coalition with Milanović at the helm. Kukuriku won the election with an absolute majority of 81 seats. The election was the first in which rival HDZ was not the leading individual party in Parliament.

Milanović was elected by the Croatian Parliament as the Prime Minister of Croatia, having taken office on December 23, 2011.

See also

• Cabinet of Zoran Milanović

References

1. Kršten sam i vjenčan u crkvi, ali nisam vjernik
2. Javno – Hrvatska
3. Zoran Milanović – Biografija
4. "Biografija: Zoran Milanović" (in Croatian). 2 June 2007. Retrieved 25 December 2011.
5. Premijerova supruga samozatajna je liječnica i majka
6. ^ http://www.24sata.hr/politika/milanovic-obecao-ostavku-ako-ne-pobijedi-sanadera-61860
7. http://www.nacional.hr/articles/view/34990/
8. BIRN: Zoran Milanovic: A New Name In Croatian Politics
9. Milanović na Bleiburgu: 'Ja sam tu zbog žrtava, a ne zbog propalih režima', Dnevnik.hr
10. Decision Was Supposed To Be Made By Main Committee

• Nacional.hr: Zoran Milanovic – The Rise of Racan's Successor
• Template:Hr icon Javno.com: Biography

External links

v t e Prime ministers of Croatia
Preceded by Presidents of the Executive Council of SR Croatia (1945–1990)
Following the first multi-party elections (1990–1991)	Stjepan Mesić Josip Manolić
Since independence (1991–)	Franjo Gregurić Hrvoje Šarinić Nikica Valentić Zlatko Mateša Ivica Račan Ivo Sanader Jadranka Kosor Zoran Milanović Tihomir Orešković Andrej Plenković

Template:Persondata

• Use dmy dates from September 2010
• 1966 births
• Current national leaders
• Government ministers of Croatia
• Living people
• Croatian politicians
• People from Zagreb
• Prime Ministers of Croatia
• Representatives in the modern Croatian Parliament
• Social Democratic Party of Croatia politicians
• Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb alumni