ZAGREB, Aug 31: The Croatian police on Tuesday arrested a former Macedonian interior minister accused of ordering the murder of six Pakistani and one Indian nationals who were made to look like militants bent on attacking Western targets.

"Because of well-founded suspicion that he committed murder, police have arrested Ljube Boskovski today," state news agency Hina reported. Boskovski, who served as Macedonian interior minister until late 2002, also has Croatian citizenship. He fled to Croatia in May when Macedonian authorities charged him and six former members of security forces with murder.

The accused are charged with smuggling the migrants into Macedonia from Bulgaria, murdering them in a staged ambush and altering the crime scene to make them appear as if they were armed militants intent on attacking Western embassies.

The aim was to ingratiate Macedonia with the West by showing it was doing its bit in the US-led war on terror. The victims were killed in March 2002. Under local law, Croatian citizens cannot be extradited for trial to another country. Macedonia formally asked Zagreb this week to put Boskovski on trial.

Boskovski has to be questioned and brought before an investigative judge, Hina said. The judge would decide if he would be held in custody and if charges would be pressed.

Boskovski has lived openly in his house in the northern Istrian peninsula, where he was arrested on Tuesday, and has given several interviews to Croatian media, denying all charges. At the time of murders, the interior ministry had said that the migrants had opened fire after police ordered them to stop in a rural area north of Skopje. -Reuters