Ratko Mladic, ex-Bosnian Serb warlord who oversaw atrocities, has died at 84

Bosnian Serb Gen. Ratko Mladic speaks to soldiers near the Bosnian town of Cazin, Sept. 4, 1994. Radivoje Pavicic/AP hide caption

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Radivoje Pavicic/AP

BELGRADE, Serbia — Ratko Mladic, the Bosnian Serb general who oversaw atrocities in Bosnia in the 1990s, has died in prison at age 84, the Serbian state RTS television and the official Bosnian Serb television reported.

The reports said that Mladic died in a U.N. prison hospital in The Hague, Netherlands. A family member of Mladic, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, confirmed the reports for the AP and said Mladic's son, Darko Mladic, was on the way to the Hague.

U.N. court officials told the AP in a statement that they could not immediately confirm Mladic's death.

The U.N. tribunal for war crimes committed during the wars in Yugoslavia in the 1990s sentenced Mladic to life in prison in 2017 in what was considered a key step toward bringing justice to the victims. He had been in custody since 2011 after many years on the run.

The ruthless, blue-eyed former communist officer-turned nationalist warlord, was one of the most notorious figures of the conflict that left more than 100,000 people dead and over 1 million homeless. He commanded his troops to "scorch the brains" of the Bosnian Muslims and boasted of being a "Serbian God."

When the ethnic war in Bosnia started in 1992, Mladic became the commander of the Bosnian Serb troops and took control of large swaths of the country to form a Serb mini-state.

Serbs under Mladic's control laid siege to the capital, Sarajevo, and other cities and villages, established concentration camps for detained non-Serb civilians and enemy soldiers, and systematically killed prisoners.