Convicted Bosnian Serb war criminal Mladić dies aged 84

Convicted Bosnian Serb war criminal Ratko Mladić has died at the age of 84 while incarcerated in a UN prison in The Hague. Mladić was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2017 for committing genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity during the Bosnian war from 1992-1995. After the conflict, he went into hiding for 16 years before being captured in rural Serbia in 2011 and put on trial in the Netherlands.

The sentence was upheld on appeal by the UN court in 2021. Mladić was receiving palliative care at the hospital within the UN detention facility when he passed away. Dutch authorities have launched an investigation into the circumstances surrounding his death, and the court's chief judge has ordered a full inquiry. Mladić's lawyers had argued that he was bedridden or in a wheelchair for a long time, and suffered a suspected stroke that left him unable to speak.

Despite this, the court maintained that he was receiving "comprehensive and compassionate treatment" during his incarceration. Survivors of the Srebrenica massacre, where Mladić's troops were responsible for the deaths of 8,000 Bosniak men and boys, expressed mixed feelings about his passing. While acknowledging the injustice of his imprisonment, they emphasized that his death does not bring closure due to the ongoing political and social divisions in the region.