Željko Kopanja

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Željko Kopanja (born 1954) is a Bosnian Serb newspaper editor and director of Nezavisne Novine, Bosnia's main independent paper published in Banja Luka. He was born in 1954 in Kotor Varoš near Banja Luka where he also graduated as an economist. He began his journalist career with the Banja Luka's daily newspaper Glas before the Bosnian War and than reported about criminal doings of Republika Srpska during the war for Belgrade's weekly newspaper Telegraf.[1]

He is known for giving detailed accounts of war crimes committed by Serbian armed forces in Bosnia for which he received numerous complaints and death threats . On October 22, 1999, he was seriously wounded after a bomb was set in his car and exploded as he opened his car door. He lost both of his legs in that incident. The perpetrators have not been found. Kopanja continues to write for Nezavisne Novine. [2]