Sunday 10 July 2022 04:18 PM Serbian war crimes suspect living in Derby council house is set for extradition ... trends now
A Serbian war crimes suspect wanted for torturing civilians during the Balkans war has been tracked down to a quiet suburb of Derby.
Milenko Maric, 62, a family man father-of-three and friendly neighbour who works as an electrician has to wear an electronic tag on his ankle and sleep in his own home each night as he awaits extradition proceedings on July 21.
He lives in a modest council house in Pear Tree and his wife, who has health issues, helps children get to the nearby primary school every day.
A shocked neighbour told The Mirror: 'He and his wife are private people – they don't speak much English, but they are perfectly nice. He has done odd jobs as an electrician and she helps at the local school.
'You would not think for a minute that he's wanted for war crimes.'
But Maric, who arrived in the UK as an asylum seeker more than 20 years ago, is accused of being part of a ruthless militia which carried out assaults on non-ethnic Serbs at the height of the Yugoslavian war in 1991.
Prosecutors in his homeland claim the assaults took place in August and September 1991 in a prison after the victims had been dragged from their homes.
Milenko Maric, 62, a family man and friendly neighbour who works as an electrician photographed outside his Derby council house, is accused of being a Serbian war criminal from crimes committed in 1991
Serbian paramilitaries occupied the region of Baranya from 1991 - 1995, where they carried out atrocities against the non-Serb population. Pictured: A Serbian tank on the border of Croatia and Serbia
Maric, who arrived in the UK as an asylum seeker more than 20 years ago, is accused of being part of a ruthless militia which carried out assaults on non-Serbs at the height of the Yugoslavian war in 1991
One victim, named Joha, alleges that Maric and two other militia men beat him with electric rubber truncheons 'on several occasions' which caused injuries to his 'entire body'.
Joha also alleges that the militia ransacked and looted his home, taking cash, a gold ring, a gold necklace and a watch.
Legal documents allege: 'MM [Milenko Maric], as a member of the Secretariat for International Affairs of Manastir, removed a number of civilians of non-Serbian ethnic origin, from the Baranya region and assaulted them.'
The region of Baranya, which today is divided between Hungary and Croatia, was the focus of fierce fighting during the Croatian War of Independence between 1991 to 1995, with 1,700 killed in Baranya's main city Osijek alone.
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