Mladic was 84 years old and serving a life sentence at the time of his death.
As recently as Monday, Serbia requested his release from prison, citing his serious illness following a stroke earlier this year. Previous attempts had been rejected.
Mladic was called the “Butcher of Bosnia.” He was arrested in Serbia in 2011 and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2017 by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia for his role in the Bosnian War and the Srebrenica genocide.
Men and boys were massacred
Srebrenica, then a Bosniak enclave in northeastern Bosnia, was captured on July 11, 1995, by the Bosnian Serb army under commander Ratko Mladic. The UN force, UNPROFOR, had promised to protect the town, but only 400 Dutch soldiers were on site. The force took in thousands of refugees at its base, but then closed its gates due to pressure.
While women and children were bused out of the area, men and older boys were taken away by the attackers to be executed. The victims were buried in mass graves. The authorities' list of missing or killed contains over 8,000 names.
“Heinous” crimes
In addition to the massacre, which is classified as genocide and considered the worst war crime in Europe since World War II, Mladic was convicted of crimes against humanity and war crimes in connection with the siege of Sarajevo.
The crimes committed were among the most heinous ever witnessed by humanity, said Judge Alphons Orie when the verdict was announced in 2017.
