Saturday 11 August 2012

Dana plane crash: Families bury human parts

Some families have been burying just body parts of the victims because of the fatality of the plane crash that made some victims lose several parts of their bodies in the accident.That explains why most of the victims’ corpses are not laid in state before burial because what is inside the coffin is just dismembered body, a human leg, head, hand or other parts of the body.

However, Chief Medical Director (CMD) of Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH), Prof. David Wale Oke, said that it is far better than mass burial and it is what is practised in advanced countries when such fatal accidents happen.

He told Saturday Sun exclusively that the handling of the victims of Dana plane crash would be compiled into a report and presented in an international forum to show Nigeria’s advancement in managing such crises like plane crash.

He also said that in a meeting between Lagos State government and the victims’ families, it was agreed that the victims be buried separately as against mass burial, which is outdated in modern societies. He recalled a mass burial of victims of a plane crash done at Ejigbo, a suburb of Lagos State, where some relations of the crash victims can not visit easily because of distance. He commended Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola for taking the bold step to carry out the forensic analyses of the victims to ensure that each family buries its dead and that each victim has a personal grave side.

Prof. Oke noted that the antecedent set by Lagos State in handling the Dana plane crash victims will serve as a pathfinder in case of future occurrences in the country. “This is because the experts that handled the Dana Plane crash victims are here in LASUTH, are Nigerians and with the experience they have gathered, can handle similar accidents if called upon.” LASUTH CMD further explained that the delay in collection of the bodies of the Dana plane crash is partly because some families have the next-of-kin of the victims outside the country.

He also officially apologised on behalf of the hospital for the beating of a journalist, Mr. Benedict Uwalaka at LASUTH mortuary on Thursday. Normal corpses claim processes are ongoing as the relatives turn out in their numbers to finish the process of getting their corpses released after which they would place them back in the morgue to pick them at their convenience. Meanwhile, the journalist has been discharged from LASUTH and gone home, while he was advised to come for regular check-up because of the injuries he sustained.

Saturday 11 August 2012

http://sunnewsonline.com/new/national/dana-plane-crash-families-bury-human-parts/

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Emotions run deep at mass grave

Lat Ngi struggled to explain to her daughter the significance of what she was holding.

“This is your grandfather,” she told the little girl, holding a 15-centimetre jaw bone segment out to the incredulous child.

“I know it is my father’s bone, because he had platinum covering his three teeth here,” the 40-year-old said, pointing to three decayed teeth pockets along the jaw. “I knew he was brought here, but I never imagined I would actually find him – I can’t find the words to say.”

Ngi, who now lives in Thailand’s Pattaya state, rushed to arrive at the site for yesterday’s ceremony for the spirits of the dead as soon as she heard the news about the recent unearthing of the Khmer Rouge-era execution pit.

A small crowd gathered around Ngi to confirm her remarkable discovery, some in awe, others in anguish.

For many, the uncovering of a mass grave in Kralanh district’s [Du Dantrei village] had inspired a measure of desperate hope to find the final remains of relatives who were executed or disappeared under the Khmer Rouge regime.

More than 300 villagers gathered at the now-halted soil excavation site to participate in the ceremony yesterday.

While monks led villagers in the blessing ritual, a small group of despairing Khmer Rouge survivors broke away to place a makeshift altar adorned with candles, a fresh pig’s head and fruit at the base of the pit where human remains, including children’s bones and 20 skulls, were dug up last weekend.

Sitting by the altar, first one, and then several more villagers began scratching at the ground with their bare hands. An older villager descended into the pit with a stick to break through the earth. In less than five minutes, the group had filled two large silver offering platters with bones, and Ngi had found her father.

However, not everyone was as fortunate as Ngi.

Vorn Mol, 57, recounted through a stream of tears that not only had she lost both her parents at this site, she had lost all four of her children, and had no way of being sure she could ever recover their exact remains.

“I don’t know what difficulty they went through before they died,” Mol, crouched in prayer, said. “I come here to dedicate to their spirits so that they will never see again what they got in this life.”

With a shaved head and cataracts creeping across her irises, Mol was vehement in stressing her wish that all remains in the area were exhumed and taken to a stupa for proper burial.

“I don’t want them buried in the mud like that,” she said. “I want to see all the skulls together in one stupa and to keep it as evidence.

“I want to request the Khmer Rouge court to find justice for these victims, and make all of the people responsible for their actions.”

According to Thuy Sam Oeut, 55, who was held at the nearby prison in a 30-person work group breaking stones, cadre conducted the executions early in the morning.

“Between 4am and 5am, I saw that they took young people and old people to this area,” Sam Oeut said. “The man who is in charge of this [….] I don’t know where he went after the regime failed.”

Many of the villagers claimed that from 1979 to early 1980, Vietnamese forces wiped out many of the former controlling Khmer Rouge cadre in the area.

Documentation Center of Cambodia director Youk Chhang told the Post on Monday that his researchers had known about the site since 1998 and had hoped it would be used for evidence at the court trying senior leaders and those most responsible for crimes during the Democratic Kampuchea period.

However, none of the villagers speaking with the Post yesterday recalled seeing or hearing of any tribunal investigators coming to the area.

Deputy village chief Moek Samkhan said he had paid a group of villagers five cans of rice per day in 1980 to excavate as many bones as they could find from the nearby furnace pit.

Rice husk and, during 1977 to 1979, humans – alive and dead – were incinerated in the pit to make fertiliser.

A thick blanket of gritty, black debris covers what remains of the 15-by-25-metre furnace pit and its surrounding area.

“We did this in 1980, and it took about one month to collect all the bones we could,” Samhan said. Those bones are now kept in cubic-metre cement containers in the shell of the former prison office on Trung Bat mountain, about 500 metres from the site of the latest discovery.

The unkempt structure is covered in graffiti and some of the cement cases are cracked and broken away, exposing the fragments of rock and bone within.

“We knew what happened there [at the furnace and prison], but we did not know there was more here too,” he said, adding he would work to fulfil the villagers’ wish that a memorial stupa be built in the area.

A stupa is pertinent, because memories will likely die with survivors, 83-year-old Kan Kimly said, her eyes blinking back tears as she spoke.

“I try to tell my grandchildren the stories, but they don’t believe,” she said, struggling to smile. “How can you believe what happened?

Saturday 11 August 2012

http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012081057922/National-news/emotions-run-deep-at-siem-reaps-killing-field.html

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Drunk Driving, Overloading Behind Meghalaya Bus Crash; Villagers Loot Victims

Initial investigations have revealed that drunken driving and overloading led to the road accident that left 30 people dead and 26 injured at Tongseng village in East Jaintia Hills district on Wednesday. Thirty persons, including women and children died while 26 were critically injured when the Tripura-bound bus fell into a deep gorge along the NH 44 early morning on Wednesday. According to Abhishek Chandra, the District Magistrate of Unakoti, “the driver who is presently undergoing treatment at Silchar Medical College Hospital, was completely drunk at the time of the mishap. The main driver died in the accident. According to sources, the ticket counter in Guwahati had issued only 36 tickets but at the time mishap 56 passengers were travelling in the ill-fated bus. Meanwhile, out of the 30 passengers who died in the bus accident only 15 were identified on Thursday. “Officials from Tripura who were camping in the district headquarter have identified as many as 15 of those who died either on the spot or succumbed to their injuries,” East Jaintia Hills Deputy Commissioner Abhishek Bhagotia said.

The district administration has set up a control room in Jowai where people can contact either through e-mail (syiem123@gmail.com) or through telephone 0365-2220711 and mobile +91 94361-06342. Officials have ruled out any fresh casualty on Thursday. Meanwhile, nine bodies were taken to Tripura. Two bodies were taken to Guwahati airport. Both were employees of the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna (RSBY). The District Magistrate of Unakoti (Tripura) Abhishek Chandra, who arrived in Khliehriat on Wednesday, made all necessary arrangements for taking the bodies of the deceased to their native places. Expenditure involved in transportation of deceased including those from West Bengal and Bihar is borne by the Government of Tripura.

Villagers Loot Victims

When mourners were grieving over their loved ones who perished in Wednesday’s bus accident at Tongseng village, the villagers, who came out to offer their helping hand in rescue operations were actually busy looting the belongings of the passengers of the ill-fated vehicle. “I am not happy with what had happened,” the District Magistrate of Unakoti District, Abhishek Chandra said on Thursday. “We could not recover even a single mobile phone. We suspect all costly belonging including cash were stolen”, said Chandra.

Local people, who were engaged in rescue operations, charged Rs 5,000 per body, a senior police official said adding Rs 2,500 was demanded per coffin. For dropping bodies, demands by vehicle owners ranged between Rs. 10, 000 to Rs. 12, 000. “It seems every one is taking advantage of the situation”, said a senior government official.

Friday 10 August 2012

http://www.northeasttoday.in/our-states/meghalaya/drunk-driving-overloading-behind-meghalaya-bus-crash-villagers-loot-victims/

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