A convicted Bosnian-Serb war criminal, Ratko Mladić, has died at 84 in a United Nations detention centre in The Hague.

The UN court confirmed the demise of Mr Mladić in a statement on Thursday. The court’s top judge “has ordered a full inquiry into the circumstances” of Mr Mladić’s death.

According to the UN, Mr Mladić was receiving care in a UN detention facility where he died on Thursday.

Rechristened the ‘Butcher of Bosnia’ for his role in the former Yugoslavia’s war between 1992 and 1995, Mr Mladić was sentenced to life in prison for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in 2017 after a trial at The Hague.

Before he was tried and jailed at The Hague, Mr Mladić fled for 16 years after the war. He was later arrested in Serbia in 2011 and made to face trial and sentencing at The Hague. 

His sentence was upheld in 2021 when he appealed it as the court heard that Mr Mladić’s soldiers carried out “ethnic cleansing” in Bosnia-Herzegovina in the 1990s.

A move to get him released from prison based on old age in May failed as the court rejected it.

Though the judge admitted Mr Mladić’s condition was “dire,” he ruled that the convicted war criminal had access to “comprehensive and compassionate treatment” in prison.