From mass graves to the Disappeared
Bosnia Expertise May Help Trace Disappeared
By Ian Starrett
Monday 20th June 2005
A man who located mass graves in Bosnia after the Balkans conflict is to be hired to help find the Disappeared victims of the IRA.
Ulster Secretary Peter Hain and Michael McDowell, the Republic’s Justice Minister, have jointly written to the Commission for the Location of Victims’ Remains, asking it to employ the British expert and granting funds to do so.
It is hoped that republican terrorists who hid the bodies will speak directly to the expert. Given immunity from prosecution, the hope is that they will take him to the secret graves.
An Irish government source said: “We have a specific person in mind but he will have to be employed by the commission rather than the government so that he will be bound not to hand over information to the prosecuting authorities.
“This person can speak directly to the Sinn Fein representative and also, we believe, to the people who have been involved in the burial and disposal of the bodies.” “We don’t want to raise the families’ hopes too much.
“Already, whole bogs have been dug up and there is nothing you can do if you are in the wrong place.
“Finding a mass grave is a very difficult proposition from looking for a single body in a bog 30 years after it has been put there.
“If there is new technology or untried methods which the expert feels will help, they will be used - there is no question about that.
“However, the key to this is good quality information from the republicans.”
A British source said: “The republicans have been pushing this and indicating that they would co-operate so you are right to think that something is imminent.”
i.starrett@newsletter.co.uk
