In the late 1990s Croatian prosecutors accused 52-year-old Dragan Vasiljkovic, a Serbian citizen residing in Australia, of committing war crimes against servicemen and civilians in the 1991-1995 Serbian-Croatian war. Also known by the alias "Captain Dragan", he was arrested in Australia in January 2006.
Investigators, in particular, have accused Vasiljkovic of participation as the commander of paramilitary Croatian Serb formations in numerous acts of violence and killing of prisoners of war in camps and jails in the cities of Knin and Glina.
But Vasiljkovic, who has dismissed all charges against him, has 15 days to appeal the ruling. If his defense fails to win the appeal, it will be up to Australia's justice minister to decide whether to extradite him.
Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia in June 1991, but Serbs, who presented a minority in the country, started a revolt and seized part of Croatia. Croatia squashed the revolt in 1995 in two military operations. Thousands of people were killed in the conflict.
