Did Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković ban media coverage of former Minister of Defense Mario Banožić after he was involved in a fatal traffic accident? No, that's not true: Articles and reports on Banožić are being published daily in all Croatian news agencies and other media outlets. There is no evidence that Plenković issued any "ban" on reporting on Banožić after the former minister was involved in a severe car crash that resulted in one casualty.
The claim appeared in a video on TikTok (archived here) published on December 6, 2023. It began (translated from Croatian to English by Lead Stories staff):
A.P. [initials of Prime Minister Andrej Plenković] issued a ban on media reporting on Banožić
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Sun Dec 10 15:43:22 2023 UTC)
The claim is contradicted by the fact that media coverage of Banožić has drastically increased since he was involved in a severe car crash in which a person died. The vast majority of Croatian media outlets publish daily articles and reports on his medical condition and updates about the accident he was involved in. Examples are here (archived here), here (archived here), and here (archived here). The most recent article (archived here) at the time of writing was published on December 9, 2023, by Croatian news agency Telegram.
Lead Stories conducted a Google search on December 10, 2023, using the following keywords: "Plenković zabrana medijima pisati o Banožiću" in Croatian (archived here), or, in English, "Plenković media ban on reporting on Banožić." The search did not reveal any factual reports on the alleged claim. A search on the official website of the Government of the Republic of Croatia (archived here) using the same keywords also showed no results to support the claim.
Lead Stories previously debunked a claim about Banožić facing four years and 11 months in prison after the fatal traffic accident he was involved in on November 11, 2023.
