You're reading: Bosnian police arrest Serb fugitive

SARAJEVO, Jan. 21 (Reuters) - Bosnian police arrested on Saturday a Serb war crimes fugitive convict who escaped from a prison in eastern Bosnia five years ago and was probably hiding in Serbia since then, a police official said.

Bosnian Serb army ex-soldier Radovan Stankovic was jailed in 2007 by the Bosnian war crimes court for 20 years for murder, rape, torture and detention of Bosnian Muslims civilians in the eastern town of Foca during the Bosnian 1992-95 war.

He was arrested on Saturday afternoon near his home in Foca after a tip-off by citizens, said a spokeswoman for the Serb Republic police.

"He tried to run away but the police arrested him near his apartment building in Foca," spokeswoman Mirna Soja told Reuters by telephone.

Stankovic was the first Bosnian war crimes suspect to be handed down by the United Nations war crimes tribunal for former Yugoslavia to the Bosnia judiciary to reduce some of the workload on the Hague-based court.

He was sent to Foca prison in April 2007 but escaped a month later, when he used a visit to the dentist to run away in a car brought by accomplices.

Soja said that all regional police forces, including the Serbian police, had been involved in the search for Stankovic over the past years.

The town of Foca has become notorious for war crimes committed by Bosnian Serbs against Muslim civilians early in the Bosnian war, including rape.