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Cyprus News Agency: News in English, 08-10-15
CONTENTS
[01] CMP - MISSING - IDENTIFICATIONS
[01] CMP - MISSING - IDENTIFICATIONS
More than 60 new identifications of remains of missing persons in
Cyprus are expected to be announced early next year, Christophe Girod,
the third member of the Committee on Missing Persons (CMP) has told
CNA. He explained that the identifications are part of the continuing
work forensic experts from the Greek Cypriot and the Turkish Cypriot
communities are involved in the Project on the Exhumation,
Identification and Return of Remains of Missing Persons. The House
Committee on Missing Persons visited today the CMP Anthropological
laboratory, located in the UN buffer zone, and the Laboratory of
Forensic Genetics of the Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics
(CING) where DNA identifications of samples of skeletal remains take
place.
Girod briefed the members of the Committee about the project,
underlining the importance of the fact that Greek Cypriot and Turkish
Cypriot experts have undertaken this task. We started the project on
the exhumation, identification and return of remains of missing persons
two years ago. We have exhumed 450 bodies so far. We have identified
105 (76 Greek Cypriots and 29 Turkish Cypriots) and we have returned
them to their families, he said and noted that this is a good start.
Girod expressed hope that the Committee will be able to keep or even to
increase the number of identifications.
Now we have created expectations among the families, rightly so and
they expect us to do more and we will try to live up to their
expectations and to identify more people in the coming months, he
pointed out. Replying to questions, Girod said the two sides are fully
cooperative, they are fully supportive, politically, financially and
their commitment is to date unabated. We expect over 60 new
identifications between the end of the year and the beginning of next
year. We will have the first identifications before the end of the year
but I cannot tell exactly when, he added.
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