THE HAGUE, Netherlands - Ratko Mladic, the former Bosnian Serb military chief facing genocide charges at a UN court, has been hospitalized with suspected pneumonia, one of his lawyers said Tuesday.
A spokeswoman for the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal where Mladic is detained confirmed the 69-year-old war crimes suspect "is currently receiving medical treatment," but said she could give no further details.
"Mladic was transferred to the Tribunal with a series of pre-existing medical conditions for which he is receiving treatment," spokeswoman Nerma Jelacic said in a statement. "The Tribunal continues to provide Mladic, as any other detainee, with the best possible medical care and attention available in the Netherlands."
Mladic lawyer Milos Saljic said jail authorities had told him that Mladic had been hospitalized "allegedly because of pneumonia."
Serbian authorities arrested Mladic in May, 16 years after he was first indicted for allegedly masterminding the worst Serb atrocities of the 1992-95 Bosnian war, including the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslim men in Srebrenica and the four-year siege of Sarajevo.
At a court appearance last week, Mladic complained that he was in poor health and suffering pain from a kidney stone.
His family also has said he suffered two strokes while a fugitive from international justice.
Saljic said in August that Mladic had undergone surgery for a hernia.
Mladic appeared to issue a veiled warning last Thursday about his fragile health, telling Presiding Judge Alphons Orie "If you put any pressure on me, it will not end well."
Medical facilities at the court's detention unit came under review by an independent panel of Swedish experts after former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic died of a heart attack in custody in 2006, and were found to be adequate.
Milosevic died shortly before his long-running trial on charges of fomenting the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s was due to finish, ending the case without a verdict.
