Prison in Portugal: Vukovar war criminal General Mile Mrkšić dies

Former commander of the army of the so-called Republic of Serbian Krajina, Major General Mile Mrkšić, died today in a prison in Portugal, where he was serving a sentence for war crimes committed in Vukovar, RTS reported today, as carried by the Patria news agency.

Mrkšić was sentenced in 2007 by the Hague Tribunal to 20 years in prison for aiding and abetting torture, cruel treatment, and the murder of 194 Croatian prisoners at the Ovčara farm on November 20, 1991.

In 1995, the court indicted him, along with Miroslav Radić, Veselin Šljivančanin, and Slavko Dokmanović, for the mass murder of more than 260 people at Ovčara, near Vukovar.

He voluntarily surrendered to The Hague in 2002, and his trial began in 2005, lasting two years.

Mile Mrkšić was born in 1947 in Vrginmost, and as an officer of the former JNA, he participated in the battle for Vukovar in 1991.

After that battle for Vukovar, he was promoted to Major General of the JNA, and later became the supreme commander of the Serbian army of Krajina in May 1995. He was retired after the defeat in August 1995.

The trial began in October 2005, and on September 27, 2007, the trial chamber of the Hague Tribunal sentenced Mrkšić to 20 years in prison for aiding and abetting torture, cruel treatment, and the murder of 194 Croatian prisoners at the Ovčara farm on November 20, 1991.