BELGRADE, Serbia — The European Union 's Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos on Friday canceled an upcoming visit to candidate nation Serbia over what she described as the "glorification" of former Bosnian Serb army commander Ratko Mladic following his death. Mladic was convicted of genocide by a U.N. court but remains a hero to many Serbs.
Mladic's remains were flown to Belgrade on a Serbian government plane from The Hague, Netherlands, on Thursday, a week after his death and days ahead of his burial in a Belgrade cemetery.
Mladic was sentenced in 2017 to life imprisonment for orchestrating the massacre of more than 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica in 1995; the yearslong siege of the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo during the 1992-95 conflict; and other war crimes, including setting up concentration camps for detained non-Serb civilians and enemy soldiers.
Upon landing in Belgrade, Mladic's coffin was wrapped in the national flag and Serbian soldiers carried his body to a van for transport to the military hospital. Serbia's Justice Minister Nenad Vujic was on the plane with Mladic's family members and nationalist admirers lit flares as the convoy passed.
Kos said on X that “the glorification surrounding his death is incompatible with the values on which the EU path is built.”
“Ratko Mladic was convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes,” Kos said. “The return of his remains to Belgrade reminds Europe of the darkest pages in our recent history.”
In Belgrade, regional N1 television quoted Serbia’s populist President Aleksandar Vucic as saying that Kos’s explanation was “very short but stupid.” Vucic said Kos did not specify “who glorified anything” but that “I guess we should ban people from showing up, ban the funeral.”
Earlier Friday, Kos said the next days “will be a very important test” for Serbia ahead of the burial, which could draw thousands of admirers.
Mladic to be buried Monday in Belgrade
Mladic’s son, Darko Mladic, said at a news conference Friday that a military commemoration is planned for Saturday. Mladic’s coffin will be placed in a church in Belgrade on Monday morning so people can pay their respects before his funeral and burial later that day.
Vujic had previously said Mladic would be buried with full state honors, sparking outrage across the Balkans, where ethnic divisions persist decades after the 1992-95 war in Bosnia killed over 100,000 people and displaced millions.
Last year, Serbia buried another convicted war criminal, the former army chief of staff Nebojsa Pavkovic, with full military honors at a cemetery for distinguished individuals.
Serbia, which backed Bosnian Serb forces during the war, is formally seeking EU membership but remains defiant over its war role, accusing the West of anti-Serb bias. After Mladic died last week, thousands of Serbs in their political entity in Bosnia and many in Serbia held vigils in his honor. Thousands could attend the funeral.
Other European officials condemn Mladic glorification
The Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Michael O’Flaherty, on Friday urged authorities in Serbia and in the Serb-run entity of Bosnia to “counter the glorification of convicted war criminals,” which is illegal in Bosnia and “is not protected speech under the European Convention on Human Rights.”
“I abhor the public glorification of Ratko Mladic, a deceased war criminal convicted for the Srebrenica genocide and crimes against humanity,” O'Flaherty said in a statement.
Belgium's Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot said granting funeral honors for Mladic would be “shameful and disrespectful for the victims,” adding: “I condemn that act in the strongest terms, and have passed this message to my Serbian counterpart in charge of European affairs this morning.”
Calls also are multiplying for Europe’s biggest political bloc – the European People’s Party – to cut its ties to Vucic’s Serbian Progressive Party. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is a member of the EPP, along with European Parliament President Roberta Metsola and other top officials.
Vladimir Prebilic, a European Parliament member from Slovenia, urged the EPP to “stop acting as a safe haven” for Vucic's party, which he said “openly celebrates convicted war criminals and rolls out the red carpet for the ‘Butcher of Bosnia.’”
Serbia's president says he has meetings on Monday
In Serbia, Vucic, who is a former extreme nationalist who backed Serbia's expansionist policies in the past, said Friday that he has previously scheduled meetings Monday, and the funeral arrangements were made by Mladic's family.
“I have spoken to the Mladic family and I wish it all passes in a dignified way,” Vucic said, according to the pro-government Informer television.
“I did all I could so that the funeral would pass as it should,” he added without elaborating.
Serbia's EU bid has stalled due to democratic backsliding and Vucic's refusal to join international sanctions against Russia over the invasion of Ukraine.
The massacre in Srebrenica was Europe’s first acknowledged genocide after World War II. A U.N. “safe haven” for Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims), Srebrenica ended up being overrun by Serbs who forced men and boys to strip, killed them and bulldozed their bodies into mass graves.
Mladic was one of the most notorious figures of the war in Bosnia that left more than 100,000 people dead and over 1 million homeless before it ended in 1995 in a U.S.-brokered peace agreement.
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AP Writers Lorne Cook and Sam McNeil contributed from Brussels.