Croatian news prose is a register with its own grammar, and the good news for a learner is that it bundles three high-value structures into one place: the nominal (verbless) headline, the se-passive that fills the bodies of reports, and reported speech with verbs like kazati and izjaviti plus da. Read one well-edited article in Jutarnji list or on the HRT site and you have drilled the nominal style, the impersonal passive, and attribution all at once. This page maps those conventions so you can read the news with grammatical X-ray vision — and, eventually, write in the register yourself.
Headline grammar: drop the verb, freeze the moment
Croatian headlines are famously compressed, and they compress in two characteristic ways. The first is to delete the verb entirely, leaving a pure noun phrase — the nominal sentence. Predsjednik u posjetu Splitu ("President on a visit to Split") has no verb at all; the locative phrase u posjetu carries the whole event. This is the headline twin of the nominal sentence.
Predsjednik u posjetu Splitu.
President on a visit to Split. — a verbless headline: the noun phrase alone, no 'is' (formal/journalistic).
Velika gužva na granici zbog turista.
Big crowds at the border because of tourists. — pure noun phrase, no verb; the 'because' phrase supplies the cause (formal/journalistic).
The second device is the historic present — the present tense used for a past event to make it feel live and immediate. Where you would expect Vatra je uništila skladište ("Fire destroyed the warehouse", perfekt), a headline writes Vatra uništila skladište (note the auxiliary je is also dropped) or, in the live-feel present, Požar guta skladište ("Fire is devouring the warehouse"). This is the same instinct English headlines follow with "Fire destroys warehouse".
Vatra uništila skladište u luci.
Fire destroyed warehouse in the port. — headline perfekt with the auxiliary 'je' dropped, standard headline shorthand (formal/journalistic).
Vlada donosi nove mjere protiv inflacije.
Government brings in new measures against inflation. — historic/announcement present 'donosi' for an action happening now or just taken (formal/journalistic).
The lead: who, what, where, packed into one nominal sentence
The opening sentence (the lead, Croatian lid or uvod) restores the verb but keeps the density. It front-loads the essentials and leans hard on verbal nouns and genitive chains — the nominal style covered on nominalization strategies. Where speech says nakon što je predsjednik stigao ("after the president arrived"), a lead writes nakon dolaska predsjednika ("after the arrival of the president"), stacking a verbal noun on a genitive.
Nakon dolaska premijera u Bruxelles započeli su pregovori o proračunu.
After the prime minister's arrival in Brussels, negotiations on the budget began. — nominal 'nakon dolaska premijera' compresses a whole clause (formal/journalistic).
Provedba reforme zdravstva odgođena je zbog nedostatka sredstava.
The implementation of the health reform has been postponed due to a lack of funds. — verbal noun 'provedba' + genitive chain + se-passive 'odgođena je' (formal/journalistic).
The se-passive: the workhorse of the news body
Croatian news rarely names a generic doer. Instead of "the police arrested two men", it writes uhićena su dvojica ("two men were arrested") or uhićuje se in the impersonal. The se-passive keeps the agent off-stage, which suits reporting where the source of an action is unknown, irrelevant, or deliberately backgrounded. The full machinery lives on passive strategies; here, just register the frequency.
Očekuje se da će kamate ostati nepromijenjene.
It is expected that interest rates will remain unchanged. — impersonal 'očekuje se da', the news writer's default for forecasts (formal/journalistic).
Istraga se nastavlja, a osumnjičeni se još traže.
The investigation continues and the suspects are still being sought. — two se-passives in one sentence, agent left unnamed (formal/journalistic).
Sumnja se da je riječ o namjernom paležu.
It is suspected that this was a case of deliberate arson. — 'sumnja se da' attributes the suspicion to no one in particular (formal/journalistic).
Reported speech: kazati / izjaviti + da, and attribution
News is largely made of what people said, so attribution verbs are everywhere. The neutral ones are kazati ("to say"), reći ("to say"), izjaviti ("to state/declare"), istaknuti ("to point out/stress"), navesti ("to state, cite"), upozoriti ("to warn"). They take a da-clause for indirect speech: Ministar je izjavio da će porezi rasti ("The minister stated that taxes will rise"). The mechanics of shifting between direct and indirect quotation are on quoting and attribution.
Gradonačelnik je izjavio da će se radovi završiti do jeseni.
The mayor stated that the works would be completed by autumn. — 'izjaviti da' + future, the standard attribution frame (formal/journalistic).
Stručnjaci upozoravaju da bi suša mogla potrajati.
Experts warn that the drought could last. — 'upozoravati da' + conditional for a hedged prediction (formal/journalistic).
The genre's signature attribution phrase is prema riječima ("according to / in the words of"), which governs the genitive: prema riječima ministra ("according to the minister"). Its cousins are prema + dative (prema izvješću "according to the report") and kako navodi ("as … states").
Prema riječima glasnogovornice, pregovori su prošli u dobrom ozračju.
According to the spokeswoman, the talks went off in a good atmosphere. — 'prema riječima' + genitive 'glasnogovornice', the classic attribution opener (formal/journalistic).
Kako navodi policija, nesreću je skrivio pijani vozač.
As the police state, the accident was caused by a drunk driver. — 'kako navodi' + nominative source, an alternative attribution frame (formal/journalistic).
Connectives: the formal glue
News prose signals its logic with a set of formal connectives you should recognise on sight: međutim ("however"), naime ("namely / that is to say", introducing an explanation), stoga ("therefore"), ipak ("nevertheless"), osim toga ("besides, moreover"), and s druge strane ("on the other hand"). These are the written-register equivalents of the casual ali, pa, zato.
Pregovori su zastali; međutim, obje strane najavljuju nastavak razgovora.
The talks have stalled; however, both sides announce a continuation of negotiations. — 'međutim' as a formal 'however', set off by punctuation (formal/journalistic).
Cijene energenata i dalje rastu, stoga se očekuju nova poskupljenja.
Energy prices keep rising, therefore further price hikes are expected. — 'stoga' + se-passive, a typical news cause-result link (formal/journalistic).
Common Mistakes
❌ Prema riječima ministru, porezi rastu.
Incorrect — 'prema riječima' governs the GENITIVE of the source, not the dative; use 'ministra'.
✅ Prema riječima ministra, porezi rastu.
According to the minister, taxes are rising. — genitive 'ministra'.
❌ Vatra je uništila skladište. (as a headline)
Not headline register — in a headline the auxiliary 'je' is dropped; full perfekt belongs in the body.
✅ Vatra uništila skladište.
Fire destroyed warehouse. — bare participle, the standard headline form.
❌ Ministar je rekao da porezi će rasti.
Wrong clitic placement — in the da-clause the clitic 'će' must sit in second position: 'da će porezi rasti'.
✅ Ministar je rekao da će porezi rasti.
The minister said taxes would rise. — 'će' in second position after 'da'.
❌ Policija je uhitila dva muškarca, ali ja ne znam zašto. (in a report)
Register clash — first-person 'ja ne znam' breaks the impersonal news voice; use the se-passive and leave the doubt impersonal.
✅ Uhićena su dvojica, no razlozi zasad nisu poznati.
Two men were arrested, though the reasons are not yet known. — se-passive plus impersonal 'nisu poznati'.
Key Takeaways
- Headlines delete the verb (Predsjednik u posjetu) or the auxiliary (Vatra uništila skladište), and use the historic/announcement present (Vlada donosi mjere) for immediacy.
- Leads restore the verb but keep the density, leaning on verbal nouns and genitive chains (nakon dolaska premijera).
- The se-passive is the body's workhorse (očekuje se da, sumnja se da), keeping the agent off-stage.
- Reported speech runs on kazati / reći / izjaviti / istaknuti / upozoriti
- da, with prema riječima
- genitive as the signature attribution phrase.
- da, with prema riječima
- Formal connectives — međutim, naime, stoga, ipak — supply the logical glue; reading news trains the nominal style, the se-passive, and attribution all at once.
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- Quoting and AttributionB2 — Attributing words to a source — reporting verbs kaže, tvrdi, smatra, dodaje; prema + dative 'according to'; the distancing navodno 'allegedly'; and Croatian's own quotation marks „…”.
- Verbless and Nominal SentencesB2 — Where Croatian drops the copula — headlines, labels, proverbs, definitions and exclamations — and why je/su is otherwise required, unlike in Russian.
- Nominalization StrategiesC1 — Turning clauses into noun phrases — the verbal noun in -nje with its genitive object, abstract -ost nouns, and condensing a da- or temporal clause into a noun phrase — and the formal register this creates.
- Academic and Formal Written StyleC1 — The grammar of scholarly Croatian — impersonal se-constructions, nominalisation, the authorial mi, precise connectives, and the infinitive over da.
- Formal vs Informal CroatianB1 — Register in Croatian is a bundle of choices — pronoun (ti/Vi), syntax (infinitive vs da-clause), vocabulary (purist zrakoplov vs colloquial avion) and spelling — that must move together, not one switch.