Ratko Mladic Asks for Hospital Treatment in Russia

Ratko Mladic’s lawyers filed a motion to the UN war crimes court in The Hague on Tuesday asking for temporary release so the former Bosnian Serb general can get treatment at a hospital in Russia.

The motion said that 74-year-old Mladic had a “complicated and potentially life-threatening condition” and needed the treatment to “mitigate the effects of six years of detention”.

“According to several medical findings which we enclose, it is clear that Mladic’s health is being impaired by chronic and new threats, which are being exacerbated as long as he stays in the prison environment,” it added.

The lawyers submitted the opinions of three doctors who said that Mladic was not getting the medical care he needed in the Hague Tribunal’s detention unit, and this was causing “serious deterioration of [his] health situation”.

Mladic has had several serious health problems while in detention and his condition deteriorated again earlier this month, his lawyers warned.

“These new symptoms are signs that raise the alarm about the possibility of a new stroke or heart attack, which could lead to death,” the motion said.

Mladic is on trial for genocide in Srebrenica, the persecution of Bosniaks and Croats throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina, which reached the scale of genocide in several other municipalities, terrorising the population of Sarajevo and taking UN peacekeepers hostage.

The defence and prosecution gave their closing statements in his trial in December last year.

The verdict is due in November.