November 18,?2004  
 
 
WIESENTHAL CENTER URGES CROATIA TO TAKE LEGAL ACTION AGAINST ESCAPED CROATIAN NAZI WAR CRIMINAL MILIVOJ ASNER DISCOVERED LIVING IN AUSTRIA; GRANTS FIRST REWARD OF “OPERATION: LAST CHANCE” PROJECT
 
 

The Simon Wiesenthal Center announced that it has appealed to the Croatian judicial authorities to expedite the investigation of escaped Croatian Nazi war criminal Milivoj Asner, who was recently discovered living in Klagenfurt, Austria. Asner fled Croatia in early July 2004 following his exposure as the World War II police chief of the city of Slavonska Pozega by the Center and the Targum Shlishi Foundation at the official launch of their “Operation: Last Chance” project which offers financial rewards for information which will facilitate the prosecution and punishment of Nazi war criminals.

In a meeting held earlier this week in Zagreb, the Center’s chief Nazi-hunter Dr. Efraim Zuroff urged Croatian Attorney-General Mladen Bajic and his deputy Slavko Zadnik to take measures to facilitate the prosecution of Asner for his World War II crimes and discussed various means to achieve that end. On the same day, the Center and the Targum Shlishi Foundation, headed by philanthropist Aryeh Rubin, awarded the first financial reward in the framework of “Operation: Last Chance” to Alen Budaj, of Zagreb, who carried out the research used to expose Asner as a Nazi war criminal. Dr. Zuroff gave the check for $5,000 dollars to Budaj at a special press conference held at the offices of the Croatian Civic Committee for Human Rights in Zagreb.


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