In two to three days Petrac will be transferred to the Korydallos maximum security prison in Athens, Ioannis Tzorzis told Hina, declining to reveal any details of the arrest of the 50-year-old businessman or the identity of the two other Croats arrested together with Petrac on a ferry that was about to depart from Igoumenitsa for the Italian seaport of Ancona.
Petrac was arrested by Greek police and members of the Coast Guard on board the 'Superfast V' ferry early Wednesday morning, Tzortzis said.
Petrac, for whom Interpol issued an arrest warrant, has been on the run since the kidnapping of the underage son of General Vladimir Zagorac in February last year. A year later the Zagreb County Court ruled that he masterminded the abduction and sentenced him to six years in prison.
Petrac was mentioned as a person with connections in the underworld for the first time at the trial of a Zagreb crime ring. Several witnesses named him as a connection between mobsters and some public and political figures. Although he was not sentenced at the time, Petrac was unavailable to police during the whole trial and returned to Zagreb only after the court dismissed the prosecution's allegation about the existence of such criminal organisation.
During the one and a half years while on the run, Petrac sent a letter to the Croatian parliament's human rights committee through his attorney, complaining that he was prevented from protecting his rights, namely from submitting an appeal due to lack of an integral verdict.
The committee in late May this year informed the Justice Ministry of Petrac's objections, one of which was that the authorities, media and secret services were calling him the key figure of organised crime in the country and a helper of fugitive general Ante Gotovina.
After the European Union refused to open membership talks with Croatia this March, saying that Croatia had failed to fully cooperate with the Hague war crimes tribunal, the Croatian government launched an action plan to destroy the network of Gotovina's helpers and track down the fugitive general.