War criminal Ratko Mladic buried with military honors in Belgrade, Serbia

Several thousand people lined the streets of Belgrade on Monday to follow the funeral service and burial of former Bosnian Serb army commander Ratko Mladic .

Earlier in the day, Serbian Patriarch Porfirije personally officiated at the funeral service for the former general, who died while serving a life sentence in The Hague for genocide in Srebrenica and other war crimes committed during the violent breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

In accordance with his wishes, Mladic was laid to rest at Topcider Cemetery beside his daughter, who died by suicide in 1994.

Informer TV, a staunchly pro-government broadcaster, carried live coverage of what it described as a "magnificent farewell," without mentioning the roughly 8,000 Bosniak civilians and prisoners massacred by Mladic's Bosnian Serb forces in Srebrenica in July 1995 .

President Aleksandar Vucic did not attend the funeral, citing a previously scheduled visit by his counterpart from Uzbekistan.

Observers say that the president has tried to chart a middle course on the issue of Mladic's funeral.

Mladic was not buried with state honors, but with military honors, with Vucic insisting that the state was merely respecting the wishes of the family and ensuring a dignified burial.

"Were we supposed to forbid people from attending, forbid the funeral itself and create dog cemeteries?" he said in response to criticism from the EU .