POLITICAL ACTIVITES OF JURAJ KRNJEVIĆ DURING THE WORLD WAR II

Na temelju dokumentarne građe autor prati Krnjevićeva istupanja kao potpredsjednika jugoslavenske izbjegličke vlade u Londonu, u kojoj je kao predstavnik Hrvatske seljačke stranke i zamjenik njena predsjednika dr. Vladka Mačeka zastupao hrvatske interese. On prihvaća obnovu Jugoslavije, ali traži za Hrvatsku bolji položaj od onoga koji je imala prema sporazumu Cvetković-Maček iz 1939. godine.After the Axis forces invaded the Kingdom of Yugoslavia on April 6, 1941, Vladko Maček who was the deputy prime minister of the Yugoslav government and leader of the Croat Peasant Party (HSS) left Belgrade and returned to Zagreb. He appointed Juraj Krnjević to take over his duties in the government. Krnjević joined the government which left the country and in the exile he acted as the representative of the HSS, whose policy was the post-war re-establishment of the Yugoslav state along with the reestablishment of the autonomous Croatian Banovina which already existed in the 1939-1941 period. Krnjević renounced the Ustasha regime headed by Ante Pavelić, which came to power in Croatia after the collapse of Yugoslavia. At the same time he fought against the Serb politicians in the government who wanted to establish Serb dominated Yugoslavia after the war. Krnjević’s views were the most strongly expressed in his speech at the Radio London in the summer of 1941 and in the memorandum written by a group of the exiled Croat politicians in the end of that same year. Particular attention must be given to the Krnjević’s memorandum sent to the British government in 1943. It contained answers to the British interpellation sent to Krnjević. The memorandum explains the aims of the Croatian politics as seen by HSS. After the war Croatian state would remain part of the Yugoslav state. Croatian borders would be even enlarged in comparison with the autonomous Croatian Banovina which was established in 1939. Krnjević defended his views at the conferences of the exiled Yugoslav government, which often confronted him with the Serb ministers, especially with the prime minister Slobodan Jovanović