A man forced to flee war in Croatia as a child has used social media to find and thank the siblings from Wales, who sent him a Christmas present more than 30 years ago.
Dalibor Sentic was 10 when in the early 1990s his family fled the newly independent country – which had recently become involved in the Balkan war – for Stockholm, Sweden.
Dalibor had received a gift from two young siblings, eight-year-old Claire and Peter, six, from Mold, Flintshire, and had hoped to track them down but only had limited information on them.
Decades later, Dalibor, now 44, was able to find the pair to thank them, saying the gesture had “meant a lot” at a time of great difficulty.
Describing fleeing his homeland as a child, Dalibor said “we had basically nothing”.
“It was like starting all over again.
“I was so innocent but remember hearing the bombs,” he said.
Dalibor said that, despite the conflict surrounding them, his parents made sure he felt “loved and secure”, although he added that moving countries was “tough on a kid”.
Some months before they fled, Dalibor said his teacher took him into a room full of packages, telling him to choose one to open.
It contained a picture of Claire and Peter, which he held onto for more than three decades.
“The older you get the more you understand the meaning behind small gestures… it meant a lot,” he said.
