Miroslav Kurak

Miroslav Kurak is a former member of Serbia’s State Security Service whose name became nationally known because of the long-running prosecution over the 1999 murder of journalist Slavko Ćuruvija. Kurak was twice convicted at first instance with other former security officials, but the legal endpoint is crucial: in 2024 the Belgrade Court of Appeals announced a final acquittal of Kurak, Radomir Marković, Milan Radonjić and Ratko Romić.

State Security background

Kurak worked in the Serbian State Security system during the era in which the service played a major role in domestic surveillance and political security. That institutional background made him part of the same wider historical environment as figures such as Jovica Stanišić and Franko Simatović, although their individual roles and cases were very different.

The murder of Slavko Ćuruvija became the event that defined Kurak’s public profile.

Murder of Slavko Ćuruvija

Journalist and publisher Slavko Ćuruvija was shot dead outside his Belgrade home on 11 April 1999, during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. He had been an outspoken critic of the government of Slobodan Milošević. The killing became one of Serbia’s most important unresolved attacks on the press.

Years later, prosecutors charged former State Security officials Radomir Marković, Milan Radonjić, Ratko Romić and Miroslav Kurak. Kurak was tried in absentia for much of the case.

First-instance convictions

The case produced first-instance convictions in 2019, with the defendants receiving long prison terms. A later proceeding again resulted in convictions. For several years, therefore, many media profiles described Kurak as one of the men convicted in the Ćuruvija case.

That description is now legally outdated if presented without the later appellate outcome.

Final acquittal

In February 2024, the Belgrade Court of Appeals publicly announced that it had overturned the convictions and acquitted all four defendants. According to the court summary reported by RTS, the appellate judges found that the prosecution allegations had not been proved beyond the required standard and that neither direct nor indirect evidence reliably established the defendants as the perpetrators.

The acquittal is final. That fact must be stated prominently anywhere Kurak is discussed. He should not be described as the murderer of Ćuruvija or as a convicted participant in the killing.

Why the case remains important

The acquittal did not end public controversy over the murder. Journalists’ organizations and the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation criticized the outcome and argued that the failure to secure final convictions represented a major institutional failure. Those reactions are part of the history of the case, but they do not change the legal status of the defendants.

This distinction is especially important for the archive. The site can document the prosecution, earlier convictions and criticism of the final judgment while still making clear that Kurak was ultimately acquitted.

Relationship to Milorad Ulemek and later testimony

Milorad Ulemek “Legija” became part of the public narrative around the Ćuruvija case because of testimony and statements concerning former State Security personnel. Those statements were debated in court and media coverage. They should be represented as testimony or allegations, not independent proof.

The cross-link is nevertheless useful because it demonstrates how many major Serbian cases from the 1990s and early 2000s intersect through the same security institutions and recurring witnesses.

Classification in the archive

Kurak should not be placed in the People crime catalog solely because he was prosecuted in a famous murder case. The final judgment acquitted him. Under the site’s own classification rules, the correct treatment is a contextual public person page linked to the Ćuruvija assassination and the State Security cluster, unless a separate documented criminal conviction establishes a basis for Rogue classification.

This is an important quality-control test for the entire project: being notorious, accused or repeatedly named in the press is not the same as being a criminal-profile subject.

Legacy

Kurak’s significance to the archive comes from the legal history of the Ćuruvija case. His page should function as part of the event graph: Slavko Ćuruvija, the 1999 assassination, the former State Security defendants, the sequence of first-instance convictions and the final 2024 acquittal.

Handled this way, the profile adds depth without turning unresolved public suspicion into a factual verdict that the court ultimately did not make.