The European Union formally condemned Serbian ministers who attended the funeral of Ratko Mladic, the Bosnian Serb general convicted of genocide and crimes against humanity, after thousands gathered in Serbia to mark his burial.
Mladic was convicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and later the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals for his role in the 1992–1995 Bosnian War, including the Srebrenica massacre in which more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were killed. He died while serving a life sentence. His death and subsequent burial in Serbia reignited debates about war-crimes accountability and historical memory across the western Balkans.
Serbian officials attending the funeral drew sharp criticism from Brussels, with EU representatives stating the ministers' presence was incompatible with Serbia's stated aspirations for European integration. Separately, Serbian football club Red Star Belgrade displayed a tifo honoring Mladic, according to Al Jazeera, adding a public-display dimension to the controversy. DW reported that the funeral is casting a direct shadow over Bosnia and Herzegovina's upcoming vote, with Bosniak and international observers warning the ceremony glorifies a figure responsible for some of the worst atrocities in post-World War II European history. Thousands of supporters attended the burial inside Serbia, reflecting a segment of Serbian society that views Mladic as a defender of Serb interests rather than a war criminal.
The episode complicates Serbia's EU accession path and risks inflaming already fragile inter-ethnic relations in Bosnia and Herzegovina ahead of its elections. EU officials signaled that rehabilitation of figures convicted of genocide runs counter to the bloc's foundational values and the conditions attached to membership negotiations. Analysts warn the funeral's political optics could embolden nationalist sentiment in the region and undermine reconciliation efforts that have progressed slowly since the wars of the 1990s.
The EU has not announced specific sanctions or formal diplomatic measures against the Serbian ministers as of available reporting, but Brussels indicated the matter would factor into ongoing assessments of Serbia's European integration progress.