Residents have been shocked to discover a friendly neighbour is also a war crimes suspect facing extradition.
People in a quiet suburb of Derby thought of electrician Milenko Maric as a normal family man dedicated to looking after his wife and kids.
But Maric, 62, is also a former Croatian Serb police officer who is wanted for allegedly assaulting non-Serb civilians during the Balkans war.
He lives in a modest council house in Pear Tree and chats with friends over coffee and waves to neighbours.
His wife, who has health issues, helps children get to the nearby primary school every day.
A shocked neighbour said: “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."
In Croatia, Maric is accused of being part of a ruthless militia which conducted beatings during the height of the Balkans conflict.
Prosecutors in his homeland claim the assaults took place in August and September 1991 in a prison during the conflict in the former Yugoslavia.
One victim was allegedly attacked by Maric and two other militia men with electric rubber truncheons on “several occasions”, causing injuries to his “entire body.”
Joha also had cash, a gold ring, a gold necklace and watch stolen from his ransacked home.
“It is alleged that 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,” it is alleged in legal documents seen by the Sunday People.
Baranya was occupied by Serb paramilitaries throughout the 1991-95 war while Croatia battled for independence from the former Yugoslavia. The area returned to Croat control in 1998 following a handover by UN peacekeepers. More than 1,700 people were killed during the conflict in Baranya’s main city Osijek alone.
After the war, the Croat authorities hunted people accused of atrocities during the civil war. A wanted notice was issued against Maric by a judge in Croatia in 1997. His name then appeared on a list of 50 suspected war criminals published by Croat authorities in 2001. A warrant for the father-of-three’s arrest was issued by the public prosecutor’s office in Osijek the same year for crimes against humanity.
However, by then Maric, who vigorously denies the claims against him, had fled to the UK and claimed asylum. He later obtained indefinite leave to remain here. He was eventually traced to his home in Derby in June 2015 and was arrested by police. In June 2016, after a Westminster magistrates court hearing Maric was ordered for extradition to Croatia. The decision was then rubber-stamped by then Home Secretary Amber Rudd.
A trial in Croatia later found Maric innocent in his absence but the decision was overturned by the country’s Supreme Court and a new international arrest warrant was issued.
He was re-arrested by officers from the National Extradition Unit last March and is currently forced to wear an electronic tag and sleep each night at his home in Derby as he faces extradition proceedings. Maric is due to face a full hearing at Westminster magistrates court on July 21.
He told us: “I am innocent. I am wrongly accused. I’m not happy to do anything without my solicitor.
“I don’t want to give any information, just I am innocent.”
Bloodshed in Balkans
The Yugoslav Wars were bloody conflicts in the Balkans from 1991-2001 as former communist Yugoslavia split on ethnic lines.
Casualties were the worst since the Second World War, only now rivalled by the horrors in Ukraine.
The death of Yugoslav President Tito would lead to the state’s republics and regions, such as Croatia, Slovenia and Kosovo pushing for independence while Serbia wanted centralised power.
When Croatia broke away, ethnic Serbs living there fought the decision, leading to the Croatian War of Independence. In Bosnia, from 1992-95, a genocide was carried out against Bosnian muslims by local Serb forces.
Some 8,000 men and boys were killed in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre. Serb leaders involved in the atrocities have been prosecuted, most notably, in 2017, Radovan Karadzic who is serving life imprisonment.
