Branimir Glavas

Branimir Glavas was born on 23 September 1956 in Osijek, where he also studied law. After graduating, he took up a career in politics and in 1990 became one of the founding members of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ). The same year, he was elected to the Croatian Parliament.

In 1991, around the time that Croatia was declared independent from the former Yugoslavia, tensions were on the rise between the new Croatian government and the Serb minority, which had both the political and military support of Belgrade. Towards the end of 1991 and the beginning of 1992, the town of Osijek, on the front line between the Zagreb forces and the rebel units of the Croatian Serbs, was witness to the murder of 37 Serb civilians. Until the present date, only ten of those guilty of these crimes have been identified.

Branimir Glavas, at the time, was looked on as one of the Croatian politicians the most committed to the Croatian cause. During the period of the alleged facts, he was Secretary of the Osijek Municipality Defence Secretariat as well as Chief of the Osijek defence forces.

Krunoslav Fehir, a former member of the unit which Glavas commanded during the war, accused the latter of having arrested and ill treated Serb civilians, and of ordering the killing of two of them.

On 31 August 1991, he was said to have taken Cedomir Vukovic and Djordje Petkovic to warehouses located very near to his office where they were reportedly beaten and tortured then forced to drink sulphuric acid. When Vuckovic tried to escape, Branimir Glavas reportedly ordered Krunoslav Fehir to shoot him. Following this, he then allegedly told him to eliminate the other prisoner remaining in the warehouse.