A court in the Croatian town of Split has found the commander of Serbia’s Knindze (red berets) paramilitary unit, Dragan Vasiljkovic, guilty on charges of war crimes committed against Croat soldiers and civilians during the civil wars in Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Vasiljkovic was given a 15 year sentence. 

The ruling has raised tensions between the two countries since Vasiljkovic — known popularly as Captain Dragan — is honoured in Serbia and has even been the subject of folk songs. Minister of Defence Aleksandar Vulin claimed the ruling slows the Croatian justice system is “driven by revenge instead of by justice”.

Vasiljkovic was found guilty on two counts — abuse of prisoners in Knin Fortress, and an attack on a police station in the town of Glina, B92 reported on September 26. In the attack on Glina, carried out together with the commander of a Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) tank unit, civilians killed and wounded while other members of the Croat population were forced to flee, homes were damaged and destroyed, and property was looted. 

However, Vasiljkovic was found not guilty on accusations of torturing, abusing and killing captured members of the Croatian army and police in Bruska, near Benkovac, in 1993.

Earlier this month, Vasiljkovic denied all the charges and claimed he was the victim of “obsessive fascist persecution”, while his defence argued that he was not given an impartial or fair trial by the Split court, and that, as a Serb, he was treated "differently" on account of his ethnicity. 

The Croatian Prosecutor's Office in Split filed an indictment against Vasiljkovic in early 2016, nearly half a year after he was extradited by Australia to Croatia. 

Born in Belgrade in 1954, Vasiljkovic’s family emigrated to Australia when he was a child, but he returned to his native Serbia in 1990, joining ethnic Serb fighters in Croatia after Zagreb declared its independence from Yugoslavia. He also fought in Bosnia & Herzegovina. 

After the war, Vasiljkovic returned to Belgrade, where he was involved in the Serbian Renewal Movement, a centre right, monarchist political movement. However, he later moved back to Australia, living in Perth under the name Daniel Snedden, and working as a golf instructor. 

He was detained under a Croatian warrant in 2005, but fought his extradition, arguing that he would not receive a fair trial in Croatia. This was the start of a decade long legal battle, with rulings on the issue repeatedly overturned. Eventually, however, following a High Court of Australia ruling he became the first person to be extradited from Australia to face trial for war crimes.