The French association for the protection of freedom of the media called for an "enquiry into the threats and for serious steps to protect the journalist from the 'strong pressures' on him".
Drago Hedl received an anonymous letter at his home on 5 December made up of newspaper clippings and warning he would be killed like Milan Levar, an officer in the Croatian army killed in a bomb explosion in 2000 after giving evidence to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) about the army"s war crimes.
In a statement on December 7, Feral Tribune linked the threat to an article it published in July about former Croatian soldier Krunoslav Fehir who admitted helping abduct, torture and murder ethnic Serb civilians in Osijek in 1991-92.
The soldier implicated Branimir Glavas, a wartime commander of Croatian forces and current head of the Osijek municipal council, in those war crimes. Glavas has publicly denied responsibility for the abuses.