Živković, Petar

▪ prime minister of Yugoslavia

born Jan. 1, 1879 [Dec. 20, 1878, Old Style], Negotin, Serbia [now in Yugoslavia] (Yugoslavia)

died Feb. 3, 1947, Paris, France

      dictatorial premier of Yugoslavia from 1929 to 1932.

      As a young soldier at the Serbian court, Živković was involved in 1903 in the assassination of King Alexander, the overthrow of the Obrenović dynasty, and the restoration of the house of Karadjordjević in the person of King Peter I. Later he joined the so-called White Hand (Bela Ruka), a group of officers that opposed the Black Hand, an officer group of extreme nationalists.

      King Alexander I of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes appointed Živković commander of the Palace Guards in 1921 and prime minister in 1929. He invoked anticommunism to justify the dissolution of political parties and elective local governments, the persecution of the national regime's opponents, and the “reform” of the electoral process to assure a one-party system (all candidates in the 1931 election were approved by the government at Belgrade). His resignation in 1932, though voluntary, may have been a consequence of his inability to solve economic problems.

      Founder of the Yugoslav National Party, Živković became its president in 1936. After the Nazi invasion in 1941, he left the country and was in 1943 a member of the Yugoslav government-in-exile.

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