TORDINCI, May 4 (Hina) - A mass grave with victims of the Serb aggression on Croatia was discovered in the yard of the Catholic church in the eastern Croatian village of Tordinci on Tuesday. The remains of five victims were exhumed by
2pm Tuesday. According to the head of the Croatian Government Commission for Detained and Missing Persons, Lt. Col. Ivan Grujic, the Commission knew about a grave with the remains of 208 victims on that location since 1991. "There are, however, suspicions that the grave was devastated by members of the Yugoslav Army during 1993 and 1994, and that the remains of a certain number of persons were transported to other locations, which are also being searched", Grujic said. The bodies of the exhumed persons will be taken to the Forensic Institute in Zagreb for identification. According to pathologist Drinko Balicevic, the victims' remains were buried with the remains of s
TORDINCI, May 4 (Hina) - A mass grave with victims of the Serb
aggression on Croatia was discovered in the yard of the Catholic
church in the eastern Croatian village of Tordinci on Tuesday.
The remains of five victims were exhumed by 2pm Tuesday.
According to the head of the Croatian Government Commission for
Detained and Missing Persons, Lt. Col. Ivan Grujic, the Commission
knew about a grave with the remains of 208 victims on that location
since 1991.
"There are, however, suspicions that the grave was devastated by
members of the Yugoslav Army during 1993 and 1994, and that the
remains of a certain number of persons were transported to other
locations, which are also being searched", Grujic said.
The bodies of the exhumed persons will be taken to the Forensic
Institute in Zagreb for identification.
According to pathologist Drinko Balicevic, the victims' remains
were buried with the remains of several animals. One of the victims
had wire tied around the leg joint. Two persons wore civilian
clothes, and three were in uniform, Balicevic added.
Grujic said the Commission had information on another 80 mass and
single graves in eastern Croatia. "All those places will be
thoroughly searched", he stressed, adding that trial exhumations
at certain locations confirmed the assumptions that mass graves had
been devastated during the Serb occupation of the Croatian Danube
River region.
Grujic said it sometimes happened that the commission knew about a
mass grave location, but would not find in it the expected number of
victims, as was the case in Negoslavci and Berk.
Yugoslavia has not yet responded to the invitation to cooperate,
despite bilateral efforts and invitations forwarded via an
international commission for tracing missing persons.
According to Grujic, Yugoslavia "surely has at its disposal data on
the locations of mass graves in Croatia."
The mass grave in Tordinci is the 112th discovered in Croatia. So
far, 2,919 victims have been exhumed from mass and single graves.
Proceedings have been launched for the tracing of another 1,750
persons.
(hina) it jn/ha