PETRINJA: POLICE ARREST FORMER MEMBER OF SERB PARAMILITARY UNITS

SISAK, Aug 2 (Hina) - Members of the Petrinja police and the Sisak- Moslavina County department for the prevention of terrorism on Wednesday arrested Slavko Drobnjak, a former member of Croatian Serb paramilitary units, in his house in Gornja Mlinoga near Petrinja. In March last year the Sisak County Court adopted a non-final judgement sentencing Drobnjak in absentia to 20 years in prison for a war crime against prisoners of war, committed on 16 September 1991 near the villa 'Gavrilovic' in Petrinja, when 14 captured Croatian soldiers were killed. According to Sisak County court investigating judge Danko Kovac, Drobnjak returned from a refugee settlement in Kursumlija, Yugoslavia, to Croatia on July 17 this year, and was issued an ID card on July 24 at the Petrinja police station. Until his arrest he lived in his house in Gornja Mlinoga. Drobnjak was arrested on the basis of an arrest warrant issued by the Sisak County Court after the pronouncement of the non-final verdict last year. Drobnjak was taken before the investigating judge Kovac around 1 pm today and Kovac ruled that he be taken into custody. Drobnjak was sentenced together with Dragan Sanader from Sisak, Mile Sanader from Sisak, and Mile Drobnjak from Gornja Mlinoga to 20 years in prison for a war crime committed against prisoners of war. On September 16, 1991 the four men captured a number of Croatian police officers and members of the then People's Guard Corps (ZNG) and following their disarmament in the vicinity of the villa 'Gavrilovic' in Petrinja they killed 14 prisoners of war. Four seriously wounded POWs survived the execution. The other three convicted members of Serb paramilitary units are out of the reach of Croatian judicial bodies and live on the territory of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. (hina) rml ,