Milojica Kos had been named by United Nations officials as a shift commander at the Omarska prison camp in the Bosnian Serb town of Prijedor.

He is wanted by the international war crimes tribunal on charges of crimes against humanity, violations of the rules of war and violations of the Geneva Conventions.

'Open torture'

Muslim and Croat prisoners have said they were mistreated and tortured

UN officials say Muslim and Croat prisoners at Omarska were regularly and openly tortured, beaten and raped by the Bosnian Serb guards there.

Milojica Kos was detained by SFOR troops, the Nato led forces involved in Bosnia, in the main Bosnian Serb town of Banja Luka in the north of the country.

SFOR said there were no casualties in the operation.

They said the suspect surrendered as soon as he realised that there was no chance of escape.

Supervising guards

Thousands of Muslim victims of the conflict were buried in unmarked graves around Srebrenica in north-eastern Bosnia

The charges relate to activities carried out during the summer of June 1992.

Milojica Kos is accused of supervising guards who routinely killed, raped, tortured, beat and otherwise mistreated prisoners at the camp.

According to a BBC correspondent his arrest reflects a new policy by the international war crimes tribunal to target their efforts on war crimes suspects who held positions of command responsibility.

He is being taken to a detention centre at the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia in the Hague.