Envoy receives remains of Indians killed by Daesh
baghdad — The remains of 38 Indian construction workers captured and killed by the Daesh group in northern Iraq were handed over to Indian authorities in Baghdad and were to be flown home later on Sunday.
Indian Ambassador Pradeep Singh Rajpurohit said the bodies had been taken to Baghdad International Airport and would be flown back on a military flight, arriving in India on Monday.
Daesh abducted and killed the workers shortly after seizing the northern city of Mosul in the summer of 2014. Iraqi authorities discovered the remains in a mass grave last year after retaking Mosul, and positively identified the bodies last month.
The militants initially abducted 40 workers. One managed to escape, while the presumed remains of another have yet to be positively identified. Authorities are awaiting DNA samples from a first-degree relative. The workers, most from northern India, had been employed by a construction company operating near Mosul. Around 10,000 Indians lived and worked in Iraq at the time.
Meanwhile, Union Minister of State for External Affairs V.K. Singh on Sunday left for Mosul in Iraq to get back the remains.
Though 39 Indians were killed, the mortal remains of 38 will be brought back as identification of one body is still pending, Singh said before leaving.
The minister is expected to return with the bodies by late Monday, following which he will travel to Amritsar in Punjab and Patna in Bihar to hand over the mortal remains of the victims to their respective families. —