on religious topics. He was also a long-time writer for the national newspaper Novi list (from 1995 to 2009). When it comes to other newspapers or magazines, the most notable are: Feral Tribune, Globus, Glas Koncila, Novi Plamen, and Slobodna Dalmacija. He also wrote and corresponded for foreign media companies, most notably El País (Spain), BBC (United Kingdom), Monitor (Montenegro), and Nezavisne novine (Bosnia and Herzegovina). Drago Pilsel was one of the founding members of the Croatian Helsinki Committee, a human rights watch organization. He gained public attention during the mid-1990s when he investigated and located Serbian victims after the end of the Croatian independence war. He entered Knin shortly after Operation Storm and started working on that terrain. He also exposed Croatian war crimes in Lika and Gospić. He didn't get along with the Helsinki Committee chairman Ivan Zvonimir Čičak. He was expelled the Croatian Helsinki Committee in 1997. Pilsel went to Sarajevo with his wife and lived there for a couple of years. In 2002, Pilsel lead the first Zagreb Gay Pride which at the time was a great civil rights achievement. The same year, he was kicked out of the Croatian Christian journalists organisation. A few days earlier to that, Pilsel critically attacked a bishop and said that the Croatian Church was: "an inhuman, nationalist, catholic sect from which he wants to stay far away." Pilsel maintains a negative attitude against the Croatian cardinal Josip Bozanić and the institution of the Croatian Church. He believes that they are extremely right-wing oriented and want to manipulate politicians. In 2017, Drago Pilsel has signed the Declaration on the Common Language of the Croats, Serbs, Bosniaks and Montenegrins. Political activity Drago Pilsel abandoned nationalism and right-wing ideology during his time with the Franciscan order in Argentina. He described his journalist work as championing "Christian humanism, human rights culture, and anti-fascism". He was a friend and admirer of Vlado Gotovac, a famous Croatian poet and social-liberal politician during the 1990s. Pilsel helped run the 1997 presidential campaign of Vlado Gotovac, where Gotovac finished 3rd. In 2009, he joined the presidential campaign of Ivo Josipović. After winning the 2009-10 elections, Pilsel joined the presidential office and became head of the analytics department. In March 2010, he resigned for reasons unknown but it is regarded that the true reason was his column in a local newspaper where he used extreme profanity. Pilsel denies