Jakob Denzinger, a former Nazi prison guard at Auschwitz, has died in his native Croatia. He was 92.

The announcement by Denzinger's family says he was buried Saturday at a local cemetery near Osijek in eastern Croatia, after having died on Thursday.

Denzinger was among a group of former Nazis to have fled to the U.S. after the war and remained living there comfortably until their senior years - claiming millions in social security payments.

It was only in 1989 that Denzinger fled the U.S. - but it later emerged he continued to receive social security payments which totaled $360,000 (£250,000).

He was born in present-day Croatia, which was part of Yugoslavia at the time. He started serving with the Nazi SS at the age of 18, in 1942, while Croatia was under a pro-Nazi puppet regime.

He was posted at several camps, including the Auschwitz death camp complex in occupied Poland.

Denzinger moved to the U.S. after the war, settling in Ohio where he became a successful plastics industry executive.

Years later, the Justice Department uncovered his past. In 1989, as U.S. prosecutors prepared their case to strip Denzinger of his citizenship, he first fled to Germany and later moved to Croatia.

Denzinger was among dozens of suspected Nazi war criminals and SS guards who collected millions of dollars in U.S. Social Security benefits after being forced out of the U.S.

An Associated Press investigation into the issue resulted in a law in 2014 barring suspected Nazi war criminals from receiving U.S. government pension benefits.

Croatian authorities in 2014 opened an investigation of Denzinger's Second World War service, but he was never tried. He had refused to comment on the allegations.

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