| Lazo M. Kostić | |
| Office: | Commissioner for Transportation Commissioner Government |
| Term Start: | 30 April 1941 |
| Term End: | 10 July 1941 |
| Primeminister: | Milan Aćimović |
| Predecessor: | Post established |
| Successor: | Ranisav Avramović |
| Birth Name: | Lazar Kostić |
| Birth Date: | 15 March 1897 |
| Birth Place: | Kotor, Kingdom of Dalmatia, Austria-Hungary (modern-day Montenegro) |
| Death Place: | Zurich, Switzerland |
| Party: | People's Radical Party |
| Profession: | Jurist, university professor |
Lazar "Lazo" M. Kostić (Serbian Cyrillic: Лазар Лазо М. Костић; 15 March 1897 – 17 January 1979) was a Montenegrin Serb nationalist writer, economist, statistician and doctor of law.
Kostić was born on 15 March 1897 in Vranovići near Kotor, at the time part of the Kingdom of Dalmatia, Austria-Hungary (now Montenegro) to Marko Kostić and Darinka Petković. His father was an Orthodox priest, coming from a family with long monastic tradition. His mother was a daughter of a notable captain Savo Petković, personal skipper of Prince Nikola's yacht Sybil, whom he took over after Prince Nikola bought it from Jules Verne.[1] Lazo was professor at University of Belgrade School of Law at Subotica and Law university in Ljubljana and dean of University of Belgrade.[2]
After the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, Kostić joined the German-appointed Commissioner Government, which was led by Milan Aćimović. The Commissioner Administration was "a simple instrument of the [German] occupation regime", that "lacked any semblance of power". Kostić was the commissioner for transportation from 30 April until 10 July 1941 when he resigned. After that, he refused to take part in the successor puppet government, the Government of National Salvation led by Milan Nedić.
Kostić left Belgrade before its fall to the Yugoslav Partisans and the Soviet Red Army in October 1944. He was charged with collaboration In absentia on 6 March 1945.[3] Following the war, he was a defender of the Chetnik movement of Draža Mihailović, and wrote several books, advancing several controversial claims, including that Bosnian Muslims are Serbs, and that war-time Serbia was free of antisemitism.
Since the fall of communism, Kostić's works have become readily available in Serbia and many of them have been reprinted. The nationalist Serbian Radical Party has reprinted several of Kostić's works, with party leader Vojislav Šešelj personally editing the publications.[4] [5] [6] [7]