Ivan Milas (18 October 1939 – 29 July 2011) was a Croatian lawyer and politician.
Milas was born in the village of
Zmijavci
Zmijavci is a municipality in Croatia in the Split-Dalmatia County. It has a population of 2,048 (2011 census), 98% of which are Croats.
Sport
NK Croatia Zmijavci
Croatia Zmijavci is a professional football club from Zmijavci, Split-Dalmatia ...
near
Imotski
Imotski (; it, Imoschi; lat, Emotha, later ''Imota'') is a small town on the northern side of the Biokovo massif in the Dalmatian Hinterland of southern Croatia, near the border with Bosnia and Herzegovina. Imotski, like the surrounding inland D ...
in
Zagora, and graduated from the Faculty of Law at the
University of Zagreb.
Milas was close to
Marko Veselica and was active in the
Croatian Spring
The Croatian Spring ( hr, Hrvatsko proljeće), or Maspok, was a political conflict that took place from 1967 to 1971 in the Socialist Republic of Croatia, at the time part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. As one of six republic ...
in the early 1970s. In 1972, the authorities of
communist Yugoslavia charged Milas with "actions against the state", arrested and spent six months in jail awaiting trial.
He was released to prepare his defense, and subsequently fled to
Austria where he received the status of a refugee. Yugoslavia sought his apprehension, which Austrian courts denied. He was tried
''in absentia'' in Yugoslavia and received a two-and-a-half-year prison sentence.
In 1988 Milas met the Croatian historian and politician
Franjo Tuđman
Franjo Tuđman (; 14 May 1922 – 10 December 1999), also written as Franjo Tudjman, was a Croatian politician and historian. Following the country's independence from Yugoslavia, he became the first president of Croatia and served as p ...
and in August 1989 joined his newly formed
Croatian Democratic Union
The Croatian Democratic Union ( hr, Hrvatska demokratska zajednica, lit=Croatian Democratic Community, HDZ) is the major conservative, centre-right political party in Croatia. It is one of the two major contemporary political parties in Croa ...
. Milas received a passport to return to Croatia in February 1990
and was elected to the
Croatian Parliament in its
first democratic elections.
During the first phase of the
Croatian War of Independence
The Croatian War of Independence was fought from 1991 to 1995 between Croat forces loyal to the Government of Croatia—which had declared independence from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY)—and the Serb-controlled Yugosl ...
between the summer of 1991 and the spring of 1992, Milas served as the
Deputy Minister of Defence and
Deputy Minister of Justice.
Milas was reelected in the
1992 election, and served as the Minister of Justice from June 6 to August 12, 1992 and was later vice-president in the
Croatian Government, under
Hrvoje Šarinić.
On May 28, 1995, President Tuđman awarded him with the
Grand Order of King Dmitar Zvonimir. Also in May 1995, the function of the
Keeper of the State Seal ( hr, Čuvar državnog pečata) was created, and President Tuđman named Milas to the position
on May 6, 1995, where he remained until February 1, 2000. no other person was named to the position after Milas.
Milas was elected to Sabor again in the
October 1995 election.
Between 1996 and 2000 Milas was a member of the Council of the
Croatian National Bank.
He was last elected to the Croatian Parliament in the
2000 Croatian parliamentary election
Parliamentary elections were held in Croatia on 3 January 2000 to elect members of the Chamber of Representative. They were the first elections to be held after the expiration of a full four-year term of the previous Chamber of Representatives.
Th ...
, where he served until late 2003, when he retired from politics.
Milas gained considerable notoriety in the Croatian public after he publicly expressed his opinion that in the West, brain is valued in kilograms.
Ivan Milas died in Zmijavci at the age of 72.
References
External links
Ivan Milas - 4th assembly of the Croatian Parliament
{{DEFAULTSORT:Milas, Ivan
1939 births
2011 deaths
Representatives in the modern Croatian Parliament
Croatian Democratic Union politicians
Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb alumni
Justice ministers of Croatia
People from Imotski