The Hague , Netherlands ( CNN ) -- The war crimes trial of former Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic was suspended until further notice Thursday over the prosecution 's failure to disclose some evidence against Mladic , court spokeswoman Nerma Jelacic said . The abrupt suspension came only a day after the long-awaited trial began . Prosecutors had been planning to focus Thursday on the massacre of up to 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica , for which they accuse Mladic of responsibility . But the defense called for a halt to the trial after it found that the prosecution had not shown it all the evidence against Mladic . Under court rules , the defense has a right to study prosecution evidence before a trial begins . It was not clear what the evidence was or how long the delay would last , but it could be a matter of weeks . Lawyers will meet the judge Thursday afternoon to discuss how to proceed . The prosecution says that it did not show the defense all of its evidence , an apparent error that became evident when prosecutors began to lay out their case Wednesday . Mladic is accused of orchestrating a horrific campaign of ethnic cleansing during the bloody civil war that ripped apart Yugoslavia . The former general showed no remorse as his war crimes trial opened Wednesday , at one point even appearing to threaten victims in the court . He drew his hand across his neck as if cutting a throat while staring at victims of the war that introduced the phrase `` ethnic cleansing . '' At other times , the man accused of being `` the Butcher of Bosnia '' stared at them , fire in his eyes , and he once growled at the survivors . The 70-year-old former Bosnian Serb general has been indicted on 11 counts of genocide , war crimes and crimes against humanity in the 1992-95 war . His trial is taking place at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague , Netherlands , a special court established to try those responsible for atrocities during the war . On Wednesday , prosecutor Dermot Groome laid out details of the case against Mladic , saying that ethnic cleansing was not a byproduct of the war , but a specific aim of the Bosnian Serb leadership . He aimed to show that Mladic was directly responsible for atrocities carried out by his forces , who were fighting for control of land in ethnically mixed Bosnia . Sexual violence was a weapon of war , Groome said , describing a woman who said she had been raped more than 50 times , and women who were forced by Bosnian Serb forces to perform sex acts on members of their own families . Prosecutors will use survivor testimonies and video clips to make their case at a trial that is likely to last for months or years . Among those in the courtroom were the families of Srebrenica victims . `` Victims have waited nearly two decades to see Ratko Mladic in the dock , '' Param-Preet Singh , senior counsel in the International Justice Program at Human Rights Watch , said ahead of the trial . `` His trial should lay to rest the notion that those accused of atrocity crimes can run out the clock on justice . '' 2011 : Ratko Mladic captured . Mladic 's trial began after a landmark war crimes ruling last month , when another international tribunal found former Liberian President Charles Taylor guilty of aiding and abetting war crimes in neighboring Sierra Leone 's notoriously brutal civil war . Taylor got a final chance to address his court Wednesday as Mladic 's trial opened , and he said he was `` saddened '' by a verdict that he portrayed as unfair . `` Both trials are evidence of the growing international trend to hold perpetrators of atrocities to account , no matter how senior their position , '' Human Rights Watch said . Mladic eluded authorities for nearly 16 years until his capture in May 2011 , when police burst into the garden of a small house in northern Serbia . Europe 's highest-ranking war crimes suspect was discovered standing against a wall in a utility room normally used for storing farm equipment , according to a government minister . Though he was carrying two handguns , he surrendered without a fight . He was extradited for trial in the Netherlands . But from day one in custody , he has exhibited defiance and appears not to have relinquished his visceral antagonism toward his enemies . Before the trial that started Wednesday , he also drew a finger across his throat in court , a gesture aimed at some of the Srebrenica widows . At other times , he disrupted proceedings by putting on a hat in the courtroom and refusing to enter a plea . He has sought delays in his trial and said he is in failing health . In July 1995 , Mladic was in command of the Bosnian Serb army and led his soldiers into the town of Srebrenica . In the days that followed , the soldiers systematically slaughtered nearly 8,000 Muslim men and boys . Bosnia peace negotiator Richard Holbrooke once described Mladic as `` one of those lethal combinations that history thrusts up occasionally -- a charismatic murderer . '' In the three decades leading up to the violent splintering of Yugoslavia , Mladic rose rapidly through the ranks of the Yugoslav army . In 1991 , he served as a front-line commander spearheading Serb forces in a yearlong war with Croatia . By the time he took to Bosnia 's battlefields , he had become a hero to many Serbs , seen as a defender of their dwindling fortunes . In May 1992 , Bosnia 's Serbian political leaders picked him to lead the assault on their Muslim enemies who clamored for independence . Robertson : Bosnia 's future is tied to justice . Mladic wasted no time galvanizing his heavily armed forces in a siege of Sarajevo , cutting the city off from the outside world . Serb forces pounded the city every day from higher ground positions , trapping Sarajevo 's ill-prepared residents in the valley below . More than 10,000 people , mostly civilians , perished . Some observers conjured images of Sarajevo in describing Syrian attacks on the besieged city of Homs earlier this year . As the war ended in the fall of 1995 , Mladic went on the run . Shortly after Mladic was sent to The Hague last year , authorities nabbed former Croatian Serb rebel leader Goran Hadzic . He was the last Yugoslav war crimes suspect at large . Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic was arrested in 2008 . And Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic was arrested in 2001 but died before his trial could be completed . CNN 's Moni Basu contributed to this report .
The trial of the alleged Param-Preet Singh is suspended on nearly 16 years . A dispute over evidence halted proceedings against the alleged war criminal . The ex-general faces Nearly 8,000 counts of genocide , war crimes and crimes against humanity . 11 Muslim men and boys were slaughtered in Yugoslavia .