Socialite's £300,000 to free former leader

Bosnian woman reveals that she put up bail for ex-president arrested in UK

A former Bosnian refugee turned millionaire entrepreneur and socialite explained yesterday why she had put up a £300,000 surety to free her country's former president from a British prison after he was arrested on suspicion of war crimes.

Diana Jenkins, who left Britain last year to live in California, said she had paid to release Ejup Ganic because he had helped protect Bosnians "in the face of genocide" during the Balkan wars.

Dr Ganic, 64, a friend of Baroness Thatcher, was arrested on 1 March at Heathrow airport on a warrant issued by the Serbian authorities, who accuse him of involvement in the killing of wounded Serb soldiers in Bosnia in 1992.

The engineering professor, who was briefly leader of Bosnia-Hercegovina and a member of its wartime government, is a regular visitor to Britain. He was detained in London's Wandsworth prison for 10 days, prompting a diplomatic protest from his country's current president that he had been denied access to consular assistance and medication.

He was freed on bail by the High Court on Thursday but told he must remain in Britain under "stringent" conditions, which include remaining under curfew at an undisclosed London address and reporting daily to police.

Mrs Jenkins, 36, who is married to Roger Jenkins – the former Barclays banker once described as Britain's highest-paid employee – said she had been infuriated by what she saw as Dr Ganic's unjust arrest. She fled her native Sarajevo, the Bosnian capital, and spent a year in Croatian refugee camps before arriving in London in 1993 and seeking asylum.

Her brother, Irnis, was killed by Serbian forces during the 44-month siege of Sarajevo, which claimed the lives of more than 10,000 of the city's inhabitants.

Mrs Jenkins said: "Serbs murdered thousands of Bosnians, my brother among them. In the face of genocide, men like Dr Ganic defended the innocents against true war criminals such as Radovan Karadzic and Slobodan Milosevic.

"The Serbian accusations against him are part of a shameless political campaign to whitewash what really happened in Bosnia. Now he can fight these ridiculous accusations as a free man."

The philanthropist, who was born Sanela Dijana Catic, is renowned for her ability to unite her A-list contacts with prominent good causes. Last year, she hosted a party with George Clooney at her then Mayfair home which raised £10m for the actor's Darfur charity. In January she provided $1m (£660,000) to help victims of the Haiti earthquake in a joint initiative with the actor and director Sean Penn.

A Belgrade court's decision to charge Dr Ganic over the attack on a retreating Serbian column has renewed tensions between Serbia and Bosnia. The UN War Crimes Tribunal in the Hague has investigated the incident and said there are no charges to answer.

The Serbian authorities have provided an 800-page dossier to British prosecutors, who must now decide whether to seek Dr Ganic's extradition to Belgrade for trial or allow his release.