By Aleksandar Vasovic

BELGRADE, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Almost all Serbian veterans of the 1990s Balkans wars are suffering from alcohol abuse, mental health problems or other ailments, a study found.

Belgrade sent thousands to fight in Croatia and Bosnia in the early 1990s and mobilised thousands more during the 1999 conflict over Kosovo.

The government-sponsored study found almost 9 percent of the veterans suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), while another 20 percent have suffered from it in the past. Up to 54 percent have psychological or psychiatric problems.

Of the nearly 2,400 former soldiers quizzed over the year from December 2007, 84 percent said they abused alcohol or had mental conditions or other ailments. Drug abuse was recorded in 0.65 percent of all surveyed cases.

Stanislav Jankovic, a Serb who fought in Croatia, still has nightmares after his lieutenant was killed in a 1991 skirmish.

"It happened right in front of me ... now, in my dreams I am trying to convince myself he's still alive," he said on Friday.

"I feel better now, but last 15 years were sheer horror. I had to come to terms with all the death and violence, images, smells, everything," said Jankovic, 43, adding he had been treated for PTSD.

The veteran said he also "had problems with bad conscience", adding: "We fought in very dirty wars."

Europe's deadliest fighting in decades occurred in Yugoslavia's series of wars from 1991-99. About 100,000 Bosnian Muslims were killed in a 1992-1995 conflict that witnessed some of worst ethnic cleansing and atrocities since World War Two, including the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.

Veterans are "an extremely vulnerable part of the population and they are in worse shape than their counterparts from neighbouing countries", Rasim Ljajic, Serbia's minister of labour and social protection, told Reuters on Friday.

Ljajic remarks reflected the fact that most of Serbian veterans fought outside their native country.

In response to the study, Serbia will now open several centres for veterans throughout the country, Ljajic said.

After the ousting of former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic in 2000, new pro-Western authorities sought to shed the legacy of the wars, prosecute war crimes and mend ties with their former partners in now-defunct communist Yugoslavia.

Veterans believe the state abandoned them in the process.

"Most of us fought bravely, never committed a war crime and now we are sidelined completely," said Milenko, another war veteran who asked that only his first name be printed.

A 2007 study conducted in Croatia said that 1991-1995 war veterans were more prone to depression, aggression, hostility and mistrust than the rest of the population. A study in Bosnia's Serb Republic showed that more than 45 percent of war veterans suffered from post traumatic stress disorder. (Editing by Adam Tanner)

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