GRABOVAC: DELAYS IN IDENTIFYING REMAINS IN SRPSKA OSSUARIES HIDE THE SCALE OF SERB SUFFERING

BROD, OCTOBER 15 /SRNA/ – The Missing Persons Institute and the Prosecutor's Office of BiH have been obstructing the identification of human remains held in three memorial ossuaries in Republika Srpska for years in an effort to conceal the true scale of Serb suffering, said Marko Grabovac, president of the Organization for the Search for Fallen Soldiers and Missing Civilians in Brod.

Grabovac said more than 600 sets of exhumed remains had been awaiting identification for years in memorial ossuaries in Banja Luka, Nevesinje and Istočno Sarajevo. He said Republika Srpska therefore needed to establish its own missing persons office as soon as possible. "This expert team should be headed by pathologist Željko Karan so that the identification of remains in the memorial ossuaries can finally begin. Families of fallen soldiers and missing persons have been waiting for more than two decades," Grabovac told SRNA. He stressed that the Missing Persons Institute and the BiH Prosecutor's Office had been obstructing the identification process for years, claiming that completing it would reveal the true number of Serbs killed during the past war and the full extent of Serb suffering, which someone wanted to conceal. Grabovac said he expected the Republika Srpska Government to decide on establishing the office in the very near future. He reminded that the office should be established in line with an earlier conclusion by the Republika Srpska Organization of Families of Captured and Fallen Soldiers and Missing Civilians, and should employ former members of the Republika Srpska Missing Persons Commission. The list of missing persons from Republika Srpska includes 1,608 people, of whom 975 are civilians, 351 are women and 10 are children.