Bosnia’s special police arrested convicted war criminal Vinko Martinovic, known as 'Stela', on Tuesday, in the southern city of Mostar, on the basis of a Croatian arrest warrant, from where he escaped in 2016.

The Croatian Supreme Court convicted Martinovic to 10 years in prison for the murder of Jasmina Djukic in 1996. In 2017, just a few minutes before the final verdict was announced he walked out of the Zagreb County Court building and managed to escape from Croatia into BiH, whose citizenship he possesses which protected him from extradition to Croatia, Jutarnji list daily reported last year.

According to Istraga.ba, Croatia then put out an Interpol arrest warrant during which time he lived in Bosnia as a free man.

Before being prosecuted for the murder of Jasmina Djukic, Stela was sentenced by the International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague to 18 years in prison for war crimes against Bosniaks. Stela was released in 2012 after serving 12 years.

After that, the Croatian judiciary tried him for the said murder when the first instance verdict convicted him to seven years in prison. Vinko Martinovic aka Stela was arrested by the State Investigation and Protection Agency (SIPA).