BELGRADE, June 8. /TASS/. The family of Ratko Mladic, former Bosnian Serb commander, believes that his life sentence is not fair, Darko Mladic, the general’s son, told TASS on Tuesday.
"Unfortunately, we cannot view this ruling as a good one because we believe that it runs counter to the right decision. It is an unfair ruling in any case," he noted. He also lamented that he still has no information about his father’s health condition.
Darko Mladic underlined that Presiding Judge Prisca Matimba Nyambe of Zambia disagreed with the opinions of her colleagues. "I express my respect to this brave woman who is professionally independent to go against the court machine which did not grant fair trial to the general for a single moment. We are now expecting the verdict wording to read everything precisely. However, it is clear that one of the judges was just enough to rule fairly and truthfully," he added.
Ratko Mladic, former Bosnian Serb commander, was in hiding for almost 16 years until he was arrested in Serbia in May 2011 and extradited to The Hague. Mladic was sentenced to life in prison by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia on November 22, 2017, for genocide, crimes against humanity, and violation of laws and customs of war. The tribunal found him guilty on ten out of eleven counts and only acquitted him on the charge of genocide in six municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Mladic was convicted for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide in Srebrenica.
In March 2018, Mladic’s attorneys filed an appeal, demanding that all procedural mistakes be corrected and that he be cleared on all ten charges.
The former commander suffered three strokes and one heart attack in prison. According to his defense team, he did not receive adequate medical help in prison.