A Croatian army official, Gen Rahim Ademi, turned himself in to the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague yesterday, becoming the first Croat to face charges for atrocities committed during the war against secessionist Serbs.
Gen Ademi (47) had been the target of a secret indictment that was unsealed after he arrived in The Hague and was given to the tribunal, said a spokesman, Mr Jim Landale, of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).
According to the indictment, Gen Ademi led a Croatian assault in September 1993 on the so-called Medak pocket in central Croatia during which Serb civilians and soldiers who surrendered to the Croats were killed. Gen Ademi is also allegedly responsible for burning down Serb villages in the region, in violation of the Geneva Convention on the Laws and Customs of War.
He is accused of persecution on political, racial or religious grounds, murder and plunder of public or private property - all crimes against humanity.
Dressed in full uniform and accompanied by his lawyer, Mr Cedo Prodanovic, and wife Anita, Gen Ademi arrived in Amsterdam at 11 a.m.
Before boarding the plane in Zagreb a visibly emotional Gen Ademi said: "I did not commit any crime during the Homeland War" - referring to the 199195 conflict.
"I feel completely innocent. I go to The Hague with a clear conscience." His surrender to the ICTY followed a controversial decision by the Croatian government to co-operate fully with the tribunal and turn over two wanted suspects.
The second suspect, also under sealed indictment, is said to be retired general Ante Gotovina who led the 1995 Operation Storm in which Croatia won back most of the territory seized by rebel Serbs.
The decision to hand over the two wanted men sparked a storm of protest in Croatia where the military victory over the Serbs is lauded as a high point in the country's struggle to win independence from Yugoslavia.
The Bosnian Serb parliament passed a bill yesterday paving the way for co-operation with the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague.
The bill defines the conditions under which a war crimes suspect can be arrested on Bosnian Serb territory and handed over to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.