Mass graves to be investigated
Kurds find three more sites in a formerly IS-held town in Iraq
IRBIL, Iraq — Kurdish officials said Sunday three more mass graves have been found in the northern town of Sinjar, where Kurdish forces backed by heavy U.S.-led airstrikes drove out Islamic State militants earlier this month.
The discovery brings the total number of burial sites in the area to five and the total number of bodies uncovered to between 200 and 300, according to local officials. While experts say proper excavation and identification of the bodies could take months, Sinjar residents are expressing frustration with the process so far, complaining that their requests from the Kurdish Regional Government for expert help have gone unanswered.
Residents are seeking a faster identification process and assistance in rebuilding the town, much of which is uninhabitable after more than a year of clashes and airstrikes. The graves found over the weekend are believed to contain 80 to 100 bodies, Qasim Simo, the head of security in Sinjar, said on Sunday. Two were uncovered to the east of the town and one was found within the western edges of Sinjar town itself.
Local media reports showed some of the burial sites being excavated with heavy construction equipment. At others, Kurdish Peshmerga fighters were seen moving what appeared to be human remains into plastic garbage bags.
“The important thing is that the site is secure,” said Kevin Sullivan of the International Commission on Missing Persons, an organization that specializes in war crimes documentation, including the excavation of mass grave sites.
“The site needs to be controlled, for example, by police or under authority of a prosecutor and the bodies need to be exhumed in a systematic way with any identifying artifacts,” he said. Careful record-taking is key to being able to initiate war crimes proceedings in the future, he added.