ER's Goran Visnjic to pay child support after admitting paternity

Actor Goran Visnjic - Dr. Luka Kovac in the U.S. TV series ER - has acknowledged having a child from an extramarital affair and has agreed to pay child support.

Visnjic, 35, was granted visits with the girl at his request, according to a lawyer in the case.

He initially had insisted on a paternity test after Mirela Rupic, a 36-year-old woman from his hometown, sued him, saying her daughter was the result of an affair with him in the summer of 2006.

At the hearing before a Zagreb court Tuesday, Visnjic's lawyer, Marijan Hanzekovic said the actor had abandoned requests for paternity test and recognized the eight-month-old child as his. He agreed to support her with 9,000 kuna (US$1,800) a month.

Visnjic was granted visits once a month, said Rupic's lawyer, Nenad Skare.

Visnjic, who lives in Los Angeles, has also appeared in films with Nicole Kidman and George Clooney. He has been married to Ivana Vrdoljak since 1999. The couple adopted a son this spring.

In an interview after Rupic's lawsuit was filed Visnjic acknowledged one encounter with her, but insisted he remembered nothing from that night because of jet lag and alcohol. "I was always against cheating," he said at the time. "I still can't believe I did it."