The Institute for Missing Persons of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) and the State Commission for Prisoners of War, Hostages and Missing Persons of Azerbaijan signed a Memorandum of Understanding in Baku. The goal is to strengthen cooperation in the process of searching for, exhuming, and identifying missing persons.
The memorandum was signed in Baku within the framework of a three-day conference on missing persons held in Azerbaijan under the name Baku Dialogue on Missing Persons – “Uniting efforts and strengthening cooperation in resolving the issue of missing persons.”
The memorandum was signed by Marko Jurisic, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Missing Persons of BiH, and Ali Naghiyev, President of the State Commission for Prisoners of War, Hostages and Missing Persons of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
The memorandum more precisely defines mutual cooperation, which will be carried out through the exchange of experiences, acquired knowledge, and practices in the processes of searching for, exhuming, and identifying missing persons who are victims of armed conflicts in both countries, as well as through the establishment of secure databases related to missing persons. The aim of joint activities is to facilitate and speed up the process of searching for the missing, as well as to provide necessary assistance to the families of missing persons.
“BiH has very significant experience in searching for missing persons, and we are sure that it can greatly help Azerbaijan, and especially the families of the missing in that country, in shedding light on the fate of missing persons,” said Naghiyev.
Jurisic pointed out that the signing of the memorandum represents a formal framework for cooperation between the two institutions in the process of searching for missing persons.
“Our countries have the same or similar experiences related to the destruction that resulted in the disappearance of a large number of innocent people. We believe that our cooperation, through the exchange of experiences and best practices, will contribute to the process of searching for missing persons both in BiH and in Azerbaijan, and that we will find as many missing persons as possible so that we can hand over their mortal remains to their families,” he stated.
In addition to Jurisic, members of the Advisory Board, as part of the Institute’s delegation, are also participating in this conference and will address those present, that is, the delegations of 43 participating countries and five international organizations. Within the framework of the conference, participants will also visit the Karabakh region, as well as graves with the mortal remains of victims that were recently discovered in that area.
