Vjerica Radeta

Radeta insulted Democratic Alliance of Croats in Vojvodina leader Tomislav Žigmanov in May 2018, calling him an Ustasha.

On 24 July 2018, Radeta responded to the recent death of Hatidža Mehmedović, founder of the Mothers of Srebrenica organization, by tweeting, "Who is going to bury her? The husband or sons?" Mehmedović's husband and two sons were killed by Serbian forces in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre. Her statement was immediately condemned by several politicians and human rights groups in Serbia. Zorana Mihajlović, one of Serbia's deputy prime ministers, said, "we are used to listening to the ugliest words from the [Radical Party] officials, but I could not believe that they are so shameless to offend the dead [...] this is not the shame for the Radicals, it is a disgrace for those who voted for them and brought them to the parliament." Representatives of the Sandžak Council for Protection Of Human Rights and Freedom and other institutions from this region of Serbia, mostly populated by Bosniaks, urged Serbian civil society and media to distance themselves from "this sublimate of fascism" and "clearly reject it and support justice for both dead and alive.”

In March 2017, Interpol issued high-priority red notices for the arrests of Radeta and her two colleagues. Rasim Ljajić, a deputy prime minister of Serbia, responded by stating that, "There is a Serbian court ruling that they will not be surrendered. There is no legal ground for this, and we have to respect the conclusions of the independent judicial authorities."

With the wrapping up of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in December 2017, Radeta's case was transferred to the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals. The matter remains unresolved, and Radeta continues to serve as a member of the Serbian parliament, as does Jojić. Ostojić died of natural causes in June 2017 without having been arrested or extradited.

The Radicals returned to the assembly with the 2016 election, winning twenty-two mandates. Radeta, who once again received the sixth position on the party's list, was accordingly re-elected. The party once again serves in opposition, and Radeta serves as the deputy leader of its assembly group. She is also a member of the assembly committee on constitutional and legal issues and the committee on the rights of the child; a deputy member of the committee on administrative, budgetary, mandate, and immunity issues; and a member of the parliamentary friendship groups with Belarus and Russia. At the beginning of this sitting of parliament, she was selected as one of six deputy speakers of the assembly.

The three accused declined to go to The Hague to face the charges, and a Serbian court subsequently ruled that the country was not obligated to extradite them; the ruling indicated that Serbian law only requires the extradition of persons accused of serious offences such as war crimes, not those accused of contempt of court or other comparatively minor crimes. The tribunal continued to demand that the accused be extradited, arguing that Serbia's existing legislation could not be used as an excuse for non-compliance and urging the country to change its legislation to comply with the arrest warrants. Foreign affairs minister Ivica Dačić responded in August 2016 that Serbia's law on extraditions had been adopted by the Serbian parliament in cooperation with international agencies, that no objections were raised at the time, and that the tribunal had no authority to propose changes.

In January 2015, Radeta and two other members of the Radical Party (Petar Jojić and Jovo Ostojić) were charged with contempt of court by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia for having allegedly "threatened, intimidated, offered bribes to or otherwise interfered with" witnesses in the trial of party leader Vojislav Šešelj. According to Agence France Presse, Radeta was specifically charged with having "allegedly contacted a prosecution witness and told him Šešelj's lawyers 'would help him' if he changed his testimony" in a contempt of court case against the Radical Party leader; the witness, the report continues, later received a monthly payment from the Radical Party and a list of questions and answers to memorize.

Radeta was listed as a vice-president of the Radical Party in a 2012 news report.

The Radical Party organized a rally in Belgrade to protest the extradition of Ratko Mladić to The Hague in 2011. Radeta was quoted as saying, "I don't expect any incidents. Our call to citizens, to our members and to supporters of the Serbian Radical Party was public and it was an invitation to come to a peaceful demonstration." The protest subsequently turned violent; Radeta said that she had not expected riots, on the grounds that "members and supporters of the Radical party have never been in any extremist groups."

Serbia's electoral system was reformed in 2011, such that parliamentary mandates were awarded in numerical order to candidates on successful lists. Radeta received the sixth position on the Radical Party's list in the 2012 parliamentary election, in which the party failed to cross the electoral threshold to win representation in the assembly. She received the same position in the 2014 election, when the party again failed to win representation.

In July 2008, Radeta took part in Belgrade rally against the Serbian government's decision to extradite former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadžić to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague for crimes committed during the Bosnian War. During a Radical Party press conference held against the backdrop of the rally, she said that Serbian president Boris Tadić could meet the same fate as Zoran Đinđić, the former Serbian prime minister who was assassinated in 2003 after approving the extradition of Slobodan Milošević. Radeta was quoted as saying, "We are not threatening (him), but we are warning of the curse which followed all the traitors in Serbian history." She was also quoted as saying that the Radicals had asked the Serbian Orthodox Church to state its opinion on the extradition, as only the church could formally excommunicate members and cast anathemas on them. Her comments were widely reported in the international media, including by the New York Times. Nada Kolundžija, a prominent member of Tadić's Democratic Party in the National Assembly, responded that "Radeta's comments could be interpreted as a call for violence, as justification for [Đinđić]'s murder," and some of the president's supporters called for legal action to be taken against Radeta.

A serious split took place in the ranks of the Radical Party later in 2008, with several prominent members joining the more moderate Serbian Progressive Party under the leadership of Tomislav Nikolić and Aleksandar Vučić. Radeta remained with the Radicals and was identified as a leading figure in the party's hardline wing, party aligned with leader Vojislav Šešelj. During an assembly debate in September 2008, Radeta shouted, "A curse on every Radical, on his seed and family, who ever meets with Tadić after the shameful extradition." The Economist subsequently noted that this comment referred to Nikolić, who had met with Tadić do ensure the passage of a key agreement with the European Union. Nikolić, for his part, made dismissive remarks about Radeta in this period.

Radeta was included on the Radical Party's list for the 2007 parliamentary election and was again selected for its assembly delegation in the parliament that followed. She served as a member of Serbia's Republic Election Commission during this time. She received a fourth mandate following the 2008 election, in which she was promoted to the eighth position on the Radical Party's list. The Radical Party remained in opposition throughout this period.

Radeta received the forty-second position on the Radical Party's electoral list in the 2000 Serbian parliamentary election, in which party won twenty-three seats. She was not initially selected for its assembly delegation but was awarded a mandate on 25 March 2003 as the replacement for another member who had resigned. (From 2000 to 2011, Serbian parliamentary mandates were awarded to sponsoring parties or coalitions rather than to individual candidates, and it was common practice for the mandates to be awarded out of numerical order. Radeta's list position had no bearing on when, or whether, she received a mandate.) The Radical Party served in opposition during this period.

She was awarded the thirty-fifth position on the Radical Party's list for the 2003 Serbian parliamentary election. The party won eighty-two seats, and she was awarded a mandate for a second term. Although the Radicals won more seats than any other party in the 2003 election, they fell well short of a majority and continued to serve in opposition. During her second term in parliament, Radeta was deputy chair of the judiciary and administration committee. In 2005, she attempted to introduce an amendment to Serbia's Information Law to ban the registration of media outlets that, in her words, "report[ed] notorious lies by pathological liar Nataša Kandić," a Serbian human rights activist and vocal opponent of Serbian nationalism.

She appeared in the fifth and final position on the Radical Party's electoral list for the New Belgrade division in the 2000 Yugoslavian parliamentary election. The party won a single seat in the division, which was automatically assigned to the lead candidate.

Radeta served as deputy minister of justice in the government of Serbian prime minister Mirko Marjanović, presumably holding this role between 1998 and 2000, when the Radical Party was part of a coalition government with the Socialist Party of Serbia and the Yugoslav Left. In February 2000, she was included in a list of Serbian government officials prevented from travelling to European Union countries. She was also secretary of the municipal assembly of Zemun in the 1990s.

Vjerica Radeta (Serbian Cyrillic: Вјерица Радета ; born 15 October 1955) is a Serbian politician. She is currently serving her fifth term in the National Assembly of Serbia as a member of the far-right Serbian Radical Party. She has served as a deputy speaker of the assembly since 2016.