Bosnia Steps Up Missing Persons Identifications
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The Institute for Missing Persons told BIRN on Monday that the process of identifying the remains of victims from Srebrenica and Zvornik is being stepped up ahead of mass funerals scheduled for this year, while a large-scale exhumation in the Mostar area is still underway.
It said that 95 or more Srebrenica victims will be buried at the genocide memorial in Potocari on the annual July 11 commemoration this year. Around 6,500 victims of Bosnian Serb forces are already buried there.
The Podrinje identification centre in Tuzla has also been identifying victims killed in Zvornik in 1992 and 1993 ahead of a joint funeral in Memici, Kalesija, on Wednesday.
Seven identified and 20 unidentified victims from Zvornik will be buried at the funeral. Their remains were exhumed from the Kazan-basca, Kamenica, Ramin grob and Kozluk mass graves, as well as from Fetija and Kamenica in the Zvornik area.
While digging graves in Kazan-basca, workers from the Islamic Community found two black protective bags that were formerly used by the Yugoslav National Army in an unmarked part of the cemetery. The bags contained human remains.
The Institute for Missing Persons has sent a request to the Bosnian prosecution to schedule a further exhumation there.
On Wednesday, an exhumation will also take place in Cerska, near Vlasenica, where the remains of one victim are believed to be buried.
A mass grave was found in Cerska in 2003, and the remains of 131 Bosniak victims who were killed in the area in 1992 were exhumed.
Another exhumation at the Radaca pit at Goranci in the Mostar area is also still underway after beginning a year ago. Parts of bones that are suspected to be of human origin have already been exhumed there.
The Radaca exhumation has become the longest and most expensive in Bosnia and Herzegovina to date because it is now being carried out for the fourth time.
The exhumation was conducted for the first time in 2008, when the remains of four victims were found, three Serbs and one Croat.
It was repeated in 2009 and 2012, but no remains were found.
The fourth attempt has seen the exhumation team digging to a depth of 57 metres so far, with a search of the entire pit planned.
