There are about 2,000 unidentified bodies that have been exhumed from individual, joint or mass graves in the past 20 years that are currently placed in the twelve morgues around BiH.
In cooperation with investigators of the International Commission for Missing Persons, it was concluded that a number of wrong classical identifications possibly took place until 2001, and an important number of these 2,000 unidentified victims could be those wrong identification, said Amor Masovic, the member of the Collegium of Directors of the Institute for Missing Persons of BiH, after the meeting of the Advisory Committee of the Institute for Missing Persons of BiH with families that are still searching for their missing family members from the period 1992-1996.
“In the absence of DNA laboratories in BiH, families did the identification on the basis of clothing and items that were found on victims until 2001. Therefore, we would like to appeal to families who already conducted classic identifications to help us solve this issue with wrong identifications. Families who conducted DNA identification without any DNA methods until 2001 have to donate one or two drops of blood to the competent authorities of the International Commission for Missing Persons. There is no risk for these families. The only thing that could happen is that their blood matches with the DNA profile of one of the bodies in the morgue. In that case, that would be their relative, and not the one they have identified a long time ago,” noted Masovic.
He also noted that families will be informed if there is any basis for that assumption and asked to hand over the wrongly identified bodies to the authorities of the Institute, in order for the other families to be able to find out the destiny of their beloved ones as well.
“It is not possible to happen that some family hands over the remains of someone who is mistakenly identified, and not to get the remains of their missing relatives in return,” stated Amor Masovic.
(Source: faktor.ba)
