NEWS Alleged Criminal Living In Ontario Whether you're outfitting your own home or a whole subdivision you'll find plumbing, hardware and electrical supplies. KOHLER • DELTA • MOEN • ARTISTIC BRASS • KWIKSET • FRANKLIN BRASS • SCHLAGE • BROAN 2800W. 11 Mile Rd. Berkley, MI 48072 (313) 548-5656 Between Greenfield and Coolidge 1-43U SDECIAITIES DESIGN • MANUFACTURE • INSTALL KITCHENS • BATHS CHILDREN'S BEDROOMS ENTERTAINMENT CENTERS MASTER BEDROOM SUITES DINING ROOMS • HOME OFFICES HOMEOWNERS • DESIGNERS • ARCHITECTS WELCOME FOR AN APPOINTMENT CALL 2M-5230 32445 SCHOOLCRAFT, LIVONIA, MI 34 FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 20, 1991 Our contemporary originals are made under the watchful eye of perfectionists. We proudly fashion unique furnishings of the highest quality. To those who appreciate the best, to those who can accept no less. Toronto (JTA) — A Croa- tian priest wanted by Yugoslavia for war crimes committed against Serbs during World War II has been living in Niagara Falls, Ontario, since 1956, two internationally known Nazi hunters charge. According to documents cited by former United States Justice Department lawyer John Loftus and Australian TV journalist Mark Aarons, Yugoslavia wrote to Britain in July 1947 requesting the extradition of the Rev. Karlo Dragutin Petranovic, who is now 80. The two investigators devote six pages to Petranovic in their recently released book, Ratlines: How the Vatican's Nazi Networks Betrayed Western Intel- ligence to the Soviets, publish- ed by William Heinemann Ltd. of London and distribu- ted in Canada by Butter- worths. In 1947, Monsignor Petranovic was living in Genoa, Italy —then part of Britain's postwar occupation zone. He was active in a church-run escape network that ferried hundreds of Nazi fugitives out of Europe to refuge in North and South America and Australia. Msgr. Petranovic was a captain in the Ustashi army of Croatia, a puppet state set up by the Nazis in 1941, the authors claim. A parish priest in the mixed Croatian and Serbian district of Ogulin prior to the war, he was serving as a chaplain in the Yugoslav army when the Nazis invaded in April 1941. He returned there follow- ing the collapse of Yugoslavia and the procla- mation of Croatian in- dependence, and was ap- pointed deputy to the local Ustashi leader. The Ogulin district, where Msgr. Petranovic remained throughout the war, was the scene of some of fascist Croatia's most brutal and widespread massacres of its Serbian minority. Under dictator Ante Pavelic, the Ustashi regime slaughtered over half a million Serbs, Gypsies and Jews at sites like the infamous Jasenovac concentration camp. Yugoslavia's extradition request noted that Petranovic "became a very important factor in the policy of the local Ustashi regime, which decided on the life and death of the Serbs of Ogulin and the surrounding district. As evidence shows, this policy consisted of terror against the entirely inno- cent Serbian population, resulting in the extermina- tion of about 2,000 local Serbs." The documents cited in the book, discovered by Loftus and Aarons in the Public Record Office in London, contain allegations that Msgr. Petranovic personally organized and instigated several atrocities in the summer of 1941. On one occasion, the Yugoslays claim, he directed the arrest and execution of 70 prominent Serbs. An- other time, the priest was allegedly responsible for the removal of five or six Ser- He was active in a church-run escape network that ferried hundreds of Nazi fugitives out of Europe. bian patients from the Ogulin hospital, who were then killed "in the most brutal circumstances." A third incident cited in the report was the murder of Dr. Branko Zivanovic on July 31, 1941, "on the basis of a false statement made by Petranovic." The extradition request details Msgr. Petranovic's alleged role in the persecu- tion and despoliation of Serbs in several villages in the district. It concludes by claiming that, in "addition to these crimes, the Ustashi committee at Ogulin, of which Msgr. Petranovic was an active functionary, is responsible for sending hun- dreds of local Serbs and Croats to the Ustashi con- centration camps, which resulted in the extermina- tion of the majority of them." In a taped interview with Mr. Loftus and Mr. Aarons, Msgr. Petranovic adamantly denied ever having been a member of the Ustashi. He conceded that he had lived in Ogulin during the war years, but denied any knowledge of massacres there. When pressed further, he recalled that he "heard rumors that people were dy- ing, and there were one or two Jews in Ogulin, but I don't know what happened to them. They just disap- peared."