Chasing Mladic: The Hunt for the ‘Butcher of Bosnia’
People and Power examines the story behind the hunt for Ratko Mladic, Europe’s most wanted man.
Ratko Mladic, Europe’s most wanted man, was arrested in the small Serbian village of Lazarevo in May 2011.
He had been on the run since 1995 when he was indicted by the UN war crimes tribunal.
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Mladic led the Bosnian Serb army through Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II. Together with political leader Radovan Karadzic the two men became synonymous with ethnic cleansing, the forcing of Bosnia’s Muslims and Croats from their homes.
For almost four years, the Serbs pounded the Bosnian Muslim enclave of Sarajevo with shells and raked its streets with sniper fire. But it was the events in Srebrenica which truly defined Mladic’s infamy.
As UN peacekeepers looked on, Serb forces separated Muslim men and boys from their families, and then murdered more than 8,000 of them.
Despite this, as protests in the days following his arrest have shown, Mladic remains a hero in the eyes of many Serbs, escaping capture with the help of powerful friends.
Filmmaker Oliver Pighetti and his team spent a year on Mladic’s trail trying to understand how he could evade capture for so long.
Published On 9 Jun 2011