A parliamentarian who carried constitutional politics into the Liberation Movement
He presided over the Second Session of AVNOJ in 1943, where the decision to form New Yugoslavia was taken.
Ivan Ribar was a Croatian lawyer and Yugoslavist whose career connected parliamentary politics in the kingdom with the anti-fascist Liberation Movement. As president of the Constituent Assembly in 1920 and an advocate for communist defendants under dictatorship, he carried a constitutional and oppositional tradition into wartime politics. As chair of AVNOJ and later head of Yugoslavia’s collective state presidency, he gave the new order an institutional face while its political foundations were being remade. The loss of both sons in the war marked the personal cost of that passage between political traditions.
Career timeline
- 1906Co-founded the Croatian Progressive Democratic Party; began legal practice
- 1918Member of the central committee of the National Council of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs
- 1919Vice-president of the Provisional People’s Presidency of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes
- 1920–1922President of the Constituent Assembly and National Assembly of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes
- 1942–1945Chair of the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia (AVNOJ)
- 1945–1953President of the Presidium of Yugoslavia’s National Assembly, the collective head of state
- 1960Retired from political life
The soldier-premier caught between a coup and defeat
In November 1918, reporting from Zagreb, Simović wrote that the overwhelming majority were 'taken with the idea of Yugoslav solidarity', and he blocked Italy's attempt to occupy Ljubljana by having the Serb Army enter the city first.
Dušan Simović was a Royal Yugoslav air force general who led the 27 March 1941 coup and became prime minister amid crowds cheering the overthrow of the pact with Germany. Yet in power he refused to formally repudiate the Tripartite Pact, hoping to avert a German invasion, and after the German attack he headed the London government-in-exile until 1942.
Career timeline
- 1900Graduated from the Belgrade Military Academy, commissioned second lieutenant of artillery
- 1912–1918Served in the Balkan Wars and First World War; commanded the 7th Infantry Regiment on the Salonika Front
- 1918Serbian government and Supreme Command delegate to the National Council of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs in Zagreb
- 1936–1938Commander of the Royal Yugoslav Air Force
- 1938–1940Chief of the General Staff of the Royal Yugoslav Army; resigned after advocating resistance to a German attack
- 1941.03–1942.01Prime Minister and Chief of the General Staff after the 27 March coup
- 1941–1942Head of the Yugoslav government-in-exile in London
- 1945–1946Returned to Belgrade and testified at Mihailović's trial
A Bosnian politician who embodied a multi-ethnic resistance coalition
When Ustaša leader Ljubomir Kvaternik came to Cazin in the summer of 1941 seeking his support, Pozderac refused even to grant him a meeting.
Nurija Pozderac was a Bosnian Muslim teacher turned politician from the Cazin region who refused the Ustaša regime's demand to collaborate and stood against its persecution of Serbs and Jews. With his wife Devleta he rescued dozens of Jewish refugees, and as a vice president of AVNOJ elected in 1942 he embodied the partisan movement's multi-ethnic character.
Career timeline
- 1910s–1930sTeacher in the Cazin region
- 1935Deputy in the Parliament of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia
- 1941Rejected Ustaša collaboration and joined the National Liberation Movement
- 1942President of the Cazin National Liberation Committee
- 1942Vice president of the AVNOJ Executive Board
- 1943Participant in the Battles of Neretva and Sutjeska
- 1944Posthumously awarded the Order of the People’s Liberation
A conciliator between the monarchy and the national liberation movement
In the November 1944 Belgrade talks, he accepted a coalition government and regency while leaving the monarchy for a postwar decision.
Ivan Šubašić was a Croat Yugoslav politician and lawyer who became the first head of the autonomous Banovina of Croatia before the war. As the balance shifted between the royal government-in-exile and Tito’s national liberation movement, he became the principal non-Communist intermediary between them. In 1944 he negotiated with Tito, accepted the authority of AVNOJ, and helped design a coalition government and regency while leaving the monarchy’s fate to a postwar decision.
Career timeline
- 1918–1921Served with Yugoslav volunteers, then studied law
- 1920sOpened a law practice in Vrbovsko
- 1938Elected to the Yugoslav National Assembly for the Croatian Peasant Party
- 1939–1941First Ban of the Banovina of Croatia
- 1944.06–11Prime Minister of the royal Yugoslav government-in-exile
- 1944.06Negotiated the Vis Agreement with Tito
- 1944.11Initialled the Belgrade Agreement, outlining a coalition government and regency
- 1945Foreign Minister in Tito’s government
