Ratko Mladic taken to hospital, criminal trial adjourned for day
From Laura P. Maestro, CNN
updated 7:50 AM EDT, Thu July 12, 2012
General Ratko Mladic, center, commander of Serbian forces in Bosnia, arrives at Sarajevo airport on August 10, 1993 to negotiate the withdrawal of his troops from Mount Igman.
Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, right, confers with his military chief during a meeting with the press in Pale on August 5, 1993.
Ratko Mladic talks to a Serbian soldier on February 15, 1994 at Lukavica barracks near Sarajevo six days before the NATO ultimatum.
David Scheffer, U.S. Ambassador at large for war crimes points to a wanted poster showing Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, Karadzic and Mladic in March 2000.
A Muslim woman and her husband are treated in July 1995 for injuries inflicted on them by Serb forces as they fled Srebrenica. The man died shortly after the picture was taken.
Serb nationalists protest against the U.S. and the U.N. war crimes court in Belgrade in December 2006. Their posters show pictures of Karadzic, Mladic and Vojislav Seselj with the Cyrillic writing meaning: "God saves the Serbs" and "Great Serbia."
Bosnian Muslim women who survived the Srebrenica massacre, Sabra Kolenovic, right, and Sabaheta Fejzic watch the news of Mladic's arrest in Sarajevo on May 26, 2011.
Mladic supporters protest at a rally organized by the ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party near parliament in Belgrade in May 2011.
Mladic appears at his war crimes trial on May 16, 2012. He eluded authorities for nearly 16 years until his capture in May 2011.
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
Ratko Mladic: Villain to many, hero to others
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Ratko Mladic is taken to the hospital, a court spokeswoman says
- "Proceedings were adjourned because he wasn't feeling well," the spokeswoman says
- Mladic is accused of orchestrating a campaign of ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia
- He has been indicted on 11 counts of genocide and war crimes
(CNN) -- Ratko Mladic, who is on trial on charges he masterminded an army campaign to cleanse Bosnia of Croats and Muslims, was taken to the hospital Thursday as a precautionary measure, a court spokeswoman said.
"Proceedings were adjourned because he wasn't feeling well," said Nerma Jelacic, a spokeswoman for International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. She did not release any details about his condition.
Mladic, whose trial began at the Hague in May, is accused of orchestrating a campaign of ethnic cleansing during the bloody civil war that ripped apart Yugoslavia. He has been indicted on 11 counts of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in the 1992-95 war.
Ratko Mladic: Brutal villain to many, hero to others
His trial is taking place in The Hague at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, a court established to try those responsible for atrocities during the war.
'Butcher of Bosnia' shows no remorse
Srebrenica the focus of Mladic trial
Outer Circle: 'Butcher of Bosnia' trial
In May, prosecutor Dermot Groome laid out details of the case against Mladic, saying that ethnic cleansing was not a byproduct of the war, but a specific aim of the Bosnian Serb leadership.
He said he would show that Mladic was directly responsible for atrocities carried out by his forces, which were fighting for control of land in ethnically mixed Bosnia.
Mladic eluded authorities for nearly 16 years until his capture in May 2011, when police burst into the garden of a small house in northern Serbia.
Analysis: In this battle with Mladic, women of Srebrencia hold the edge
Though he was carrying two handguns, he surrendered without a fight and was extradited to the Netherlands.
In the three decades leading up to the violent splintering of Yugoslavia, Mladic rose rapidly through the ranks of the Yugoslav army. In 1991, he served as a front-line commander spearheading Serb forces in a yearlong war with Croatia.
By the time he took to Bosnia's battlefields, he had become a hero to many Serbs, seen as a defender of their dwindling fortunes.
In May 1992, Bosnia's Serbian political leaders picked him to lead the assault on their Muslim enemies who clamored for independence.
Mladic wasted no time galvanizing his heavily armed forces in a siege of Sarajevo, cutting the city off from the outside world. Serb forces pounded the city every day from higher ground positions, trapping Sarajevo's ill-prepared residents in the valley below.
As the war ended in the fall of 1995, Mladic went on the run.
Shortly after Mladic was sent to The Hague last year, authorities nabbed former Croatian Serb rebel leader Goran Hadzic. He was the last Yugoslav war crimes suspect at large.
Photos: Years later, Srebrencia's pain is still very alive
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