London: 

In disguise: (Left) Bosnian Serb Leader Radovan Karadzic in an April 1996 file photo and (right) Karadzic in an undated photo released by Belgrade's Healthy Life magazine yesterday. pics/AP

Radovan Karadzic, one of the world's most wanted men dubbed as the 'Butcher of Bosnia' for his alleged role in atrocities during the 1990s Balkans conflict that left thousands of people dead, has been arrested in Belgrade after a 13-year-long manhunt.

Karadzic (63) was working at a medical clinic in Serbia's capital Belgrade using a false identity and was heavily disguised by a snow white beard before his arrest, Serbian officials said yesterday.

He was arrested after a weeks-long covert operation to track down the former leader, said prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic.

Karadzic is accused of ordering the deadly siege of Sarajevo and some of the worst atrocities in Europe since World War II — including the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica.

Serbian minister Rasim Ljajic told reporters that Karadzic was using false documents giving him the name of Dragan Dabic and a non-Serbian identity at the time of arrest.

"It wasn't expected at all that this would ever happen to Radovan Karadzic — that he would ever be caught in this way," said Ljajic, president of the National Council for Cooperation with the Hague Tribunal.