Croatia News - CroatiaPress.com

Zagreb, March 27 (CP) – A man allegedly rummaging through a garbage can was killed when a hand grenade exploded around midnight on Wednesday in Zagreb.

The police and an ambulance had been summoned to the scene, only to pronounce the man dead.

The incident is still being investigated and the police on the scene were tight-lipped, but it seems that the man was picking through a garbage container, possibly looking for plastic bottles when the explosion happened.

Since January 2006, people on the verge of existence can be seen picking through garbage containers in search of glass and plastic bottles, as at that time a law on bottle recycling had come into force securing a payment of 50 lipa (about€0.06) per item, enabling those in need to make an extra kuna.

Recently, the Zagreb city authorities had announced that every person picking through garbage would be fined as of this summer. However, a huge outcry by NGOs and citizens themselves had force the decision to be reversed allowing the residents of Zagreb to pick through the trash, although this has proved deadly for one of them.

It is yet to be seen how the hand grenade ended up in the trash container in, practically, the centre of Zagreb and whether there are more such death traps lying around.