Ratko Mladic, who was found guilty of genocide for masterminding the 1995 massacre of over 8,000 Muslims in one of Europe’s most horrific events post-World War II, has passed away.
Mladic’s demise occurred while under UN custody on Thursday, according to his lawyer Dragan Ivetic, who did not disclose the cause of death. The former general spent his final months in the hospital section of the UN detention facility located in a suburb of The Hague, as confirmed by Ivetic.
The mass killing in Srebrenica marked the brutal conclusion of a conflict that endured more than three years, during which Mladic relentlessly attacked the besieged Sarajevo with artillery, tanks, mortars, and heavy gunfire, resulting in the deaths of 10,000 individuals.
The victims from Srebrenica were hastily buried in mass graves over a four-day period in July 1995, with some remains being dug up and relocated to distant mountains in an effort to conceal the evidence of the atrocities.
The objective, as determined by the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), was “ethnic cleansing” aimed at expelling Bosnian Muslims, Croats, and other non-Serbs to establish a Greater Serbia.
The tribunal concluded that Mladic, along with Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic and Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic, were part of a criminal scheme to execute the plan.
During an ICTY hearing in 2014, Mladic, known as the “Butcher of Bosnia,” dismissed the court’s legitimacy. Upon receiving a life sentence in 2017, he vehemently protested, declaring it all to be fabricated lies.
Karadzic, also convicted of genocide in 2016, and Mladic remained at the top of the ICTY’s most-wanted list for an extended period after Western powers concluded the conflict. Mladic, however, lived undisturbed in Belgrade until Milosevic was overthrown in 2000.
Mladic, born in 1943 according to his son despite official records indicating an earlier birthdate, was an officer in the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) when Yugoslavia began to disintegrate in 1991.
When Bosnian Serbs rebelled against Bosnia’s Muslim-led secession in 1992, Mladic was chosen to lead the new Bosnian Serb army, which swiftly conquered 70% of the country. Numerous towns were besieged with heavy weaponry, former JNA armaments, and villages were razed as UN troops stood by with limited intervention.
A combination of Western pressure, covert American support for Croats and Muslims, and determined NATO airstrikes eventually turned the tide against Mladic’s forces.
Despite Western appeals, the post-Milosevic Serbian government refrained from taking action against Mladic, who remained a revered figure among nationalist Serbs. Mladic was finally apprehended in 2011 without resistance, displaying signs of physical decline, including a weakened arm likely due to an untreated stroke.
His health continued to deteriorate, suffering a heart attack in 2013, and appearing frail and aged. Despite his numerous requests for release on compassionate grounds being denied, his conviction appeal was also rejected in 2021.