Dragomir Karić

Karić was born in Peć, Kosovo and Mehotija, in what was then the People's Republic of Serbia in the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia. He graduated from the University of Belgrade Faculty of Organizational Sciences in 1972. Karić received a Ph.D. from the Institute of Agrarian Economics at the Ukrainian Academy of Agronomy Sciences in 1994, was a founder of the International University of Business and Management in Moscow, and holds a number of academic positions.

Karić's family was described in the 1990s as one of the richest in Serbia; more recent reports suggest that their wealth and influence, though reduced, remain significant. A prominent member of the Braća Karić (Brothers Karić) group and its affiliated companies, Karić has overseen several business initiatives in Russia, Eastern Europe, the Commonwealth of Independent States, and other countries. Since 2014, he has played a leading role in the Minsk-Mir project in Belarus.

NATO bombing of Yugoslavia

During the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)'s 1999 bombing of Yugoslavia, Karić attended meetings of Russian and American legislators in Vienna in an effort to bring about a peace deal. American representatives Curt Weldon and Bernie Sanders both described Karić as having played an important role in the discussions, with Sanders noting that he "spoke with [Yugoslav president] Milošević repeatedly during the discussions, urging him to take the first step by releasing [three American] POWs." Members of the American team have, in fact, credited him with bringing about the soldiers' release. The negotiating teams reached an arrangement that would have seen a stop to NATO's bombing campaign, the withdrawal of Yugoslav troops from Kosovo, and the introduction of a United Nations peacekeeping force in the province. Ultimately, the initiative was vetoed by the United States Department of State. Karić also took part in confidential peace talks with German foreign affairs minister Joschka Fischer during this time.

At the conclusion of the conflict, Karić negotiated with various authorities in Russia for the reconstruction of Serbian infrastructure that had been destroyed by NATO bombing.

Curt Weldon later sought to bring Karić to the 2003 National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., but the State Department and Immigration and Naturalization Service officials refused him entry on the grounds that he was prohibited from travelling to European countries. Although Weldon has acknowledged receiving unflattering information about the Karić family from American intelligence sources, he later stated that the brothers had been pressured into providing support for the Milošević regime, for which they were unfairly maligned.

Representative of Belarus

Karić was appointed as an envoy of the Belarusian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Serbia in 2009. In 2012, Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko credited him for "significant personal contribution to the development of trade and economic ties and the strengthening of friendly relations between Belarus and Serbia."

Jovan Vraniškovski

In August 2005, Karić met with Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow in a bid to secure the release of Archbishop of Ohrid Jovan Vraniškovski from a prison in Macedonia. Patriarch Alexy gave his support to Karić's effort.

Karić joined his brother Bogoljub's Strength of Serbia Movement upon its formation in 2004. The party fielded its own electoral list for the National Assembly of Serbia in the 2007 and 2008 parliamentary elections, and Karić appeared on the party's list both times. In each instance, the list failed to cross the electoral threshold to win representation in the assembly.

The Strength of Serbia Movement contested the 2012 parliamentary election as part of the Serbian Progressive Party's Let's Get Serbia Moving list. Karić received the thirty-seventh position and was elected when the alliance won seventy-three mandates. The Progressive Party emerged as the head of a coalition government after this election, and Karić served as part of its parliamentary majority. The Strength of Serbia Movement's alliance with the Progressive Party continued into the 2014 and 2016 elections; Karić was included on its list both times and was re-elected when the Progressive-led alliance won landslide victories.

Karić was an observer for the 2015 Kazakhstani presidential election, which he described as having "high democratic standards." He also observed the 2015 Belarusian presidential election and the 2016 Belarusian parliamentary election and reached the same conclusion; on the former occasion, he was quoted as saying that in Belarus, "there is freedom, there is democracy and there is no disorder, which is the most important thing."

Karić is a member of the parliamentary committee on the economy, regional development, trade, tourism, and energy; a deputy member of the committee on Kosovo-Metohija; the leader of Serbia's parliamentary friendship groups with Belarus and Tunisia; and a member of the parliamentary friendship groups with Algeria, Argentina, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Bulgaria, China, Croatia, Cuba, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Mexico, Montenegro, Morocco, the Netherlands, Norway, Palestine, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, the countries of Sub-Saharan Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Venezuela. Though still a member of the Strength of Serbia Movement, he serves in the Progressive Party's parliamentary group.