Italian quake toll rises to 17, last victim found

MIRANDOLA, Italy - Italian rescue workers removed the last earthquake victim from the rubble Wednesday, bringing the death toll to 17 as the government approved measures to rebuild the quake-hit area so crucial to Italy's economic health. The magnitude 5.8 temblor north of Bologna on Tuesday felled old buildings and new factories and warehouses alike, many of them already weakened by a stronger quake May 20 that measured 6.0 and killed seven people. In both quakes, the death toll was disproportionately workers toiling in factories, leading to some questions about Italy's building codes or possible corruption. "I remember with sorrow the deaths in Emilia, who died while working, mostly workers but also entrepreneurs," Interior Minister Anna Maria Cancellieri said in Rome. Premier Mario Monti has promised the government would do whatever is necessary to rebuild the region. On Wednesday, the government approved measures, including raising...

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At least ten killed in 5.8-magnitude earthquake in Italy

MILAN, Italy -- An earthquake struck northern Italy on Tuesday, killing at least 10 people, damaging buildings and spreading panic among thousands of residents still living in tents after a tremor...

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Three More Body Parts of Sukhoi Victims Found

The National Search and Rescue Agency said on Tuesday that a group of 13 local people found three additional body parts from the victim’s of the Sukhoi Superjet crash on May 20. “Only three body parts were found and it is normal in the search process,” Gagah Prakoso, spokesman of the National Search and Rescue Agency (Basarnas) told the Jakarta Globe. “I don’t think it is a big deal that should be blown up. Have pity on the family. If we find a hand, does the family have to reopen the coffin?” Locals alleged they found an entire body, not just body parts. A local, Junaidi, told Antara that they found a body 500-700 meters from the crash point and they also found an identity card of a Russian citizen nearby. The National Search and Rescue Agency on May 21 decided to terminate the search and evacuation process of the victims, claiming that the Disaster Victim Identification Team from the National Police had identified all 45 victims from...

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Qatar Villaggio mall nursery fire kills 19 people

THE New Zealand children killed in a fire in a nursery in a Doha shopping mall are two-year-old triplets. Firefighters didn't know where the nursery was which caught fire in Qatar, says a New Zealander who was at the scene where three New Zealand children are believed to have been among 19 killed overnight . New Zealand Prime Minister John Key has confirmed that two-year-old triplets were killed in the fire. Seven girls, six boys, four teachers and two firefighters were believed to have died from smoke inhalation. Former New Zealand journalist Tarek Bazley was in the Doha mall when the fire broke out, saying he heard a benign alarm which sounded like a repeating doorbell, but he was told by an attendant that "it's usually a false alarm". "About 10 minutes later someone else, a member of the public, raced through this area and said 'everybody out, you've got to get out now, the other half of the mall is on fire'." Mr Bazley understood...

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Burial ceremony honours mystery victim of crashed nuclear bomber

The remains of an American airman found 60 years ago in Canada have finally been laid to rest — along with one of the Cold War’s most enduring mysteries: the identity of the only recovered victim from...

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27 killed in accident on Mumbai-Pune expressway

Twenty-seven members of a marriage party, including four children, were killed and 26 others injured when a speeding auto rammed in a stationary bus at Khalapur on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway. The incident took place in the wee hours around 1 am when the tyres of one of the mini-buses carrying a marriage party got punctured on the highway and was parked on the roadside while another bus was stationed just behind the vehicle, helping it out with the repairs, they said. The mishap occurred when a high-speeding auto lost control and rammed into the second mini bus from the rear, crushing people seated on the road between both the vehicles, police said. The deceased including women and children were returning to Pune after attending a wedding at suburban Ghatkopar in Mumbai, they said. The injured have been admitted to MGM hospital at Panvel and Pune's Sassoon hospital, where three victims were pronounced dead on arrival, police said. The...

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Argentina identifies Dirty War victim from 1976

Argentine forensic experts have identified the remains of a body that washed ashore in Uruguay in 1976. DNA tests showed that the remains were of Roque Orlando Montenegro, who disappeared a month...

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Sukhoi victims’ identification concluded: Police

The National Police’s Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) unit has concluded the identification process of the 45 people onboard the ill-fated Sukhoi Superjet 100. All of the remains have been identified. “The...

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Italy Earthquake: Finale Emilia Quake Near Bologna Kills At Least 4

SANT'AGOSTINO DI FERRARA, Italy — A strong earthquake shook northeast Italy early Sunday, killing four people, tearing off chunks of church facades and sending panicked residents into the streets....

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Search for Sukhoi Victims Ended After 10 Days

Search efforts for the victims of the crashed Sukhoi Superjet 100 were officially brought to a close on Friday, 10 days after the plane carrying 45 people collided with Mount Salak in West Java. The decision was marked with a small ceremony at the evacuation command post in Cijeruk, Bogor, led by a military coordinator of the team, Putranto. “In accordance with the National Search and Rescue Agency’s [Basarnas] decision, evacuation operations are officially ended. We will, however, continue to comb the [crash] site to search for some materials of the plane,” Putranto told journalists after the ceremony, which included joint prayer for the dead victims. The dispersed joint search team consisted of hundreds of personnel from Basarnas, the Indonesian Military (TNI) and police, as well as some volunteers and a team from Russia. The effort to find some of the materials from the crashed plane, which already turned up the cockpit voice recorder,...

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Indonesia needs finger print database

JAKARTA - It is time for Indonesia to have finger print database as it has many functions. For example, the database could also ease the identification of disaster victims of Sukhoi Superjet 100 crash, the Executive Director of Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) of Sukhoi SJ 100, Dr Anton Castilani, said on Saturday. DVI team is still having a hard time on identifying the data of the victims through the finger prints despite the ante mortem data is completely gathered. The obstacle is that the ante mortem data given by the family is different with the body parts found by the evacuation team. "The family sent us the certificate containing three finger prints from left hand, but unfortunately we found the right one. It does not match," Anton gave an example. DVI team, he added, successfully identified 15 victims. Yet, none of the identification uses the finger prints. "It is conducted by using their DNA," he explained. Saturday 19...

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Tunnel Blast Kills 19 at Chinese Construction Site

A blast in a tunnel killed 19 workers at a central Chinese highway construction site on Saturday, authorities said. The explosion in Hunan province also injured one person, said two officials from...

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Abertay University student's system uses digital networks to plot real-world disasters

The way emergency crews search for missing people following a natural disaster could be revolutionised by the work of a Dundee student. David Kane, a computing and networks student at Abertay University, has developed a programme whereby broadband routers are used to detect whether a building is still standing. By ''pinging'' internet addresses in areas affected by disasters such as tsunamis and hurricanes, David's software could provide information to assist rescue teams, detailing the extent of the disaster and the areas worst hit. David, whose work has been exhibited at the university's degree show, said: ''Responding to disasters is immensely difficult and any extra accurate information can make the difference in saving lives. ''I wanted to prove it was possible to use an ordinary piece of technology we all have, a home broadband router, to map natural disasters in real-time.'' Using Google Maps, the system shows live data from...

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15 victims of Sukhoi crash identified

JAKARTA: Forensic experts from the Indonesian police Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) team, Friday, said that they had identified 15 victims of the Sukhoi Superjet 100 which crashed at Gunung Salak, Bogor, last May 9. The victims, 10 men and five women, comprised 13 Indonesians and two of other nationalities. Head of the Indonesian Police Hospital at Keramat Jati here, Brigadier General Agus Prayitno, at a media conference which was broadcast live by several television stations, said the victims were identified through their finger prints, dental records, DNA and personal possessions. However, he said the bodies had yet to be handed over to their next of kin as some of their body parts were still missing. Until today, the hospital had received 30 body bags of the victims’ remains and belongings which were recovered from the site of the crash. The ill-fated aircraft, with 45 passengers on board, was on a demonstration flight on...

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At least 36 dies in bus accident in Vietnam

Hanoi, Vietnam - At least 36 passengers died when a bus carrying nearly 60 passengers broke the banisters of Serepok Bridge on National Highway 14, which connects Dak Lak and Dak Nong provinces in central Vietnam, and fell into the river on Thursday night, the Vietnam News Agency reported on Friday. According to the initial report, the bus, owned by a transport cooperate in Dak Lak province, some 960 km south of capital Hanoi, was on the way to Ho Chi Minh City. At around 10 p.m., while crossing the Serepok Bridge, the vehicle suddenly crashed into the banister and fell into the river, from the height of 18 meters. Rescue workers and local people were mobilized to save victims. By 3 a.m., rescue works finalized. A total of 34 people were dead on the spot and other two victims died in Dak Lak hospital, according to the report. Friday 18 May 2012 http://www.antaranews.com/en/news/82196/at-least-36-dies-in-bus-accident-in-viet-n...

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Another mass grave was found today on Balambo Mountain in Halabja

A mass grave was found Wednesday on Balambo Mountain including children and women remains. “The corpses of the mass grave might be victims of the chemical attack in the late 1980s,” Goran Adham Halabja town commissioner told Press. He said that they have indicated the location with the cooperation of Halabja Martyr association and have informed the KRG ministry of Martyr and Anfal affairs to dig up the corpses. “There might be also three other mass graves there,” he added. Halabja is a Kurdish town in Northern Iraq, located about 150 miles (240 km) north-east of Baghdad and 8–10 miles from the Iranian border. The former Baath regime bombarded Halabja with internationally banned chemical weapon in April 1988, killing 5 thousand innocent people and displacing thousands others. Those who were dead were buried nearby Halabja randomly. Wednesday 16 May 2012 http://www.komalnews.net/%28A%28tlc5BDBqzQEkAAAAMGQ3OWQ2Y2QtZmZiOC00Mjc2LTlmY...

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Police identification unit summons Sukhoi victims` family members

Jakarta (ANTARA News) - The Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) unit of the police has summoned a number of family members of the Sukhoi Superjet 100 victims to the Said Sukanto National Police Hospital in Kramat Jati, Jakarta, to help in the victim identification process. The unit will attempt to match the family members` DNA data with that of the bodies found at the crash site in Mount Salak, West Java. "The victims` families have been summoned to obtain some fingerprint, DNA and teeth samples, and this process is not yet complete," the chief of the hospital`s medical and health division Mussadeq Ishaq told reporters here on Thursday. According to Mussadeq, the families have been summoned to enrich the incomplete data stored in the DVI unit`s data base. "After this, the DVI team can do its job optimally, with almost 100 percent correct results," he remarked. As of Thursday morning, Mussadeq noted, the unit had received as many as...

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Bodies of Sukhoi Victims Kept in Containers - “The capacity of the existing container is not enough, so we bring more.”

The evacuation of the victims of the crashed Russian Sukhoi Superjet-100 through land is still underway. This morning, one body bag arrived at the Sukamto Police Hospital, Kramat Jati, East Jakarta. The body bag arrived at the Police Hospital today was temporarily kept in the mortuary before being stored into a cooling container. A joint forensic team from the Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) and Police's Inafis brought one cooling container used to store the victims’ bodies. Earlier, Director of DVI Indonesia, Chief Commissioner Anton Castilani, said the container is used to prevent the victims’ body parts from decaying. “The capacity of the existing container is not enough, so we bring more,” said Anton. The white container came at 4.30 PM on Tuesday, May 15. The container was brought into the post mortem unit in the forensic building of the hospital with the help of two forklifts. The identification process of the victims’...

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8 000 corpses still unidentified in Mexico

Even if someone had not chopped the heads, hands and feet off the victims first, the chances of investigators identifying the 49 bodies dumped on a road in northern Mexico this weekend would have been...

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Russia’s top DNA profiler to assist Sukhoi’s victims’ identification

Russia’s leading DNA expert, Pavel Ivanov, is slated to arrive in Jakarta on Tuesday to help the National Police’s Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) unit in identifying the victims of Russian-made...

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Police identify 22 fingerprints of the ill-fated Sukhoi’s victims

A total of 22 fingerprints of the ill-fated Russian-made airliner’s victims have already been identified by the National Police’s Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) unit, a spokesman says. The National Police spokesman Sr. Comr. Boy Rafli Amar was quoted by tempo.co on Tuesday as saying that the 22 fingerprints were identified from the 18 body bags that had been received by the victims’ identification team. As of Monday, a total of 25 body bags had been sent to the officials at R. Sukanto National Police Hospital in Kramat Jati, East Jakarta. Four out of 25 body bags contained victims’ personal items, such as wallets, ID cards, shoes and electronic gadgets. The forensics team helping to identify victims remains has examined 18 body bags of remains, while three additional body bags arrived to the hospital on Monday and currently undergoing testing. DVI chief Sr. Comr. Anton Castilani said that the 22 fingerprints would be cross-referenced...

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22 body bags of Sukhoi plane crash victims checked

Jakarta (ANTARA News) - The Indonesian police hospital in Kramat Jati, East Jakarta, has examined 22 body bags of the victims of the Sukhoi Superjet 100 plane that crashed on Mount Salak in West Java last Wednesday. "Until last night, the disaster victim identification (DVI) team of the Indonesian police had examined 22 body bags, of which 18 contained body parts and four contained property," the head of the hospital, Brig Gen Agus Prayitno, said on Monday. "Three more body bags were sent to the hospital on Monday morning. The bags arrived at Halim Perdanakusuma airport in Jakarta at 8.05 a.m., after being flown from a command post near the plane crash site in Mount Salak," he added. "The three body bags are now undergoing a post-mortem check," Agus explained. He said since last night the DVI team had evaluated the post-mortems conducted after the body bags of Sukhoi Superjet 100 crash victims arrived at the hospital. "The results...

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37 dead in NW China storms

MINXIAN, Gansu - The death toll had risen to 37 and 19 others remained missing as of 6 pm Friday after hail and torrential rains battered a mountainous county in Northwest China, authorities said late...

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11 Indians among 15 dead in Nepal plane crash

Eleven Indian pilgrims were among 15 people killed when a private plane crashed in northern Nepal today after hitting a hill top while trying to land at high-altitude Jomsom airport. The Dornier aircraft...

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Identification of Sukhoi crash victims may take months

While the evacuation of Sukhoi Superjet-100 crash victims is still underway, the victim`s identification may take months because many of their bodies are no longer intact, head of the police medical and health center (Pukdokkes) Senior Commission Anton Castilani told the press at the police hospital in East Jakarta Saturday. Anton said the identification process is like trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle and he compared it also with the boat accident in Trenggalek in which identification of the victims took as long as five months. The police team of the Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) has begun with identifying the contents of four body bags at the police hospital including identifying body parts, describing and making notes of special features of the victims. The return of the victims to their families cannot be done in a too short period because the team is still completing the identification process. Anton also cannot say how...

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Cause of jet crash in Java unclear, investigators say NAMING THE DEAD:：Experts flown in from Russia will cooperate with Indonesian police to identify the victims, a complicated process that could take up to half a year AFP, CIJERUK, INDONESIA Sun, May 13, 2012 - Page 4 Body bags containing the victims of a Russian jet crash began arriving in the Indonesian capital yesterday as Russian investigators flew in to join the probe into how the aircraft smashed into the side of a volcano. Rescuers said the bodies of those who perished when Sukhoi’s new Superjet 100 hit Mount Salak in western Java on Wednesday, killing all on board, were badly dismembered. Officials said the remains of the victims found so far had been placed in 16 body bags. By noon, five had arrived in Jakarta by helicopter and were taken to a police hospital for identification. “This morning we have 16 body bags. On Friday, there were 12, and four more were filled today [Saturday]....

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Antemortem data of sukhoi crash victims now complete

Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Antemortem data of all the Sukhoi Superjet 100 crash victims are now complete and are in the hands of the Indonesian police, Head of the Police Medical and Health Center Police Brig Gen Dr. Mussadeq Isshaq said in Jakarta Sunday. "All the antemortem data are complete, and we are now awaiting the results of the evacuation of the victims from the crash site," he said. Antemortem data are very important in the identification process because the victims are no longer in tact, so that it is difficult for the police to identify them, he said. The wife of one of the victims of French nationality has come to Dr Sukanto Police Hospital in Kramatjati Monday morning to collect antemortem data. In the meantime, Police Senior Commissioner dr. Anton Castilani said the crash victims are no longer in tact. ANTARA observed that the total number of body bags already sent to the Police Hospital up to Sunday afternoon has reached...

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The Russian government promised to bring a team of DNA analysis to help identify the bodies of victims Sukhoi Super Jet 100 at the Police Hospital, East Jakarta. It was submitted by the Chief of Police Hospitals Bhayangkara Brigadier Agus Prayitno a news conference after receiving five body bags, on Saturday (05/12/2012). "The Russians have not got here, but they will help the DVI teams from Indonesia to DNA identification," said Agus. In addition to teams from Russia, Disaster Victim Identification team (DVI) Police also assisted by a number of experts from universities, including University of Indonesia, University of Padjadjaran, UB and a team of forensic doctors from Banten. All results will be reported periodically indetifikasi DVI DVI Indonesia at the International center in Lyon, France. "There is a forensic pathologist, odontologi forensics, forensic DNA, forensic anthropologist who helped identify it," he explained. In the meantime,...

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As relatives wait, minister says stop circulating crash pictures.

A senior minister says people should stop circulating pictures of the victims of the Sukhoi Superjet 100 that crashed near Mt. Salak in West Java. “I have received information that pictures of the victims have already been circulating through mobile phones. This kind of action will be painful for the victims’ families. Please, stop it,” Coordinating People’s Welfare Minister Agung Laksono told reporters at Halim Perdanakusuma airport in East Jakarta on Saturday as quoted by kompas.com. Agung's statement follows the circulation on BlackBerry Messenger on Friday of a photo purportedly taken at the crash site depicting the remains of two victims. Meanwhile, dozens of relatives of the victims have assembled in front of the National Police Hospital in Kramat Jati, East Jakarta, where officials have taken five body bags containing the partial remains of victims and their personal effects for identification. Officials have prepared tents in...

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Relatives of Superjet Crash Victims Observe Recovered Bodies

The relatives of those killed when a Sukhoi Superjet plane crashed on a remote hilltop in Indonesia earlier this week gathered at a hospital in the capital Jakarta on Saturday to observe identification of the victims' bodies, the Jakarta Post newspaper reported. The partial remains of several victims' bodies from the May 9 crash were airlifted to Jakarta airport earlier on Saturday and then taken to the National Police Hospital for identification. A post-mortem of the bodies may take weeks or even years as some have already decomposed, said Anton Castilani, chief of the National Police's disaster victim identification unit. All 45 people on board the Russian-made Superjet 100 - most of them representatives of Indonesian airlines - were killed after the plane slammed into a steep mountainside outside Jakarta. The jet, Russia's first new commercial plane since the fall of the Soviet Union two decades ago, was on a demonstration flight...

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Ten foreigners killed in Indonesia plane crash

JAKARTA - A senior official at the Indonesian Disaster Victim Identification Agency (DVI) said Friday that ten foreigners were among the victims of crashed Sukhoi Superjet 100 plane in Indonesia's...

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12 bodies found near Indonesia jet crash site

Search teams found at least 12 bodies Friday near where a Russian-made jetliner crashed into the side of an Indonesian volcano while on a demonstration flight for potential buyers from airlines, an official said. All 45 aboard the Sukhoi Superjet-100 are feared dead. "Today we have discovered 12 victims, all dead," Rear Marshal Daryatmo, head of the national search and rescue agency, told reporters today. The search team used ropes to climb up to the wreckage on the near-vertical slopes of Mount Salak, search and rescue agency spokesman Gagah Prakoso said. The 10 bodies they found are being prepared to be transported from the crash site by helicopter. Local television showed what appeared to be the plane's tail with the blue-and-white Sukhoi logo, part of a wing and bits of twisted metal scattered along the slope like confetti. The jetliner slammed into the dormant volcano Wednesday at nearly 800 kph (480 mph). Russian and French investigators...

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Bodies found at Russian jet wreckage in Indonesia

Rescuers discovered bodies Thursday near the shattered wreckage of a new Russian-made passenger plane that smashed into the steep side of an Indonesian volcano during a flight to impress potential...

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4 killed in Mt Gamalama cold lava flood

Four people died as a result of a flood of volcanic material from Mt Gamalama, North Maluku, leaving at least 10 people missing while 15 others sustaining minor injuries. The four fatalities were identified as Raihan Sangaji, 9, Mildawany Johar, 25, Sarnawia Hamid, 52 and one remaining individual that was unidentified. The North Maluku and Ternate chapters of the Disaster Management Agency (BPBD) said in a statement that the officers continued to locate flood victims and damaged houses. The agencies also reported that a total of 188 houses in 11 villages had been destroyed by the flood, leaving 58 families, or 284 residents, homeless. In addition to the houses, the flood also ripped through two bridges connecting Daulasi and Air Tege-Tege villages and also the districts of Dufa Dufa and Akehuda. “We keep updating our data from the ground. A joint rescue team from the agencies, the Indonesian Military (TNI) and the police continues...

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Philippines clothing store fire kills 17 workers sleeping inside

Predominantly female staff became trapped on top floor of building in Butuan city, authorities say A fire at a three-storey clothing store in the southern Philippines has killed 17 employees, most of them women who had been asleep and found themselves trapped on the top floor, officials said. The fire in the Butuan city store broke out at 3.55am and raged for five hours. Firefighters and police scouring the gutted building found 17 bodies, the city police chief, Pedro Obaldo, said. A store employee, Mylene Tulo, who escaped with two co-workers, said she had awoken as the fire was spreading rapidly in the third-floor office where they slept. Amid the flames and cries for help, she managed to dash out with her colleagues. They sustained minor burns on their arms. "We wanted to rouse others from sleep but the fire was already too strong," Tulo said. At least 20 employees, mostly women, had been sleeping at the store when the fire broke...

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Hope fades for Nepal flood victims, toll may hit 60

KATHMANDU (AFP) - Rescuers scouring Nepal's central Annapurna region after severe flash flooding said Sunday that there was almost no hope of finding survivors and that the final death toll could be more than 60. The bodies of 17 people have been recovered but district police superintendent Sailesh Thapa told AFP that 47 missing people, including three Ukrainian tourists, were feared dead. "So far, 12 of the 17 bodies have been identified. An excavator has reached the worst affected areas and is clearing the mud," he said. "We have a list of another 47 people who have gone missing. Their chances of survival are almost zero. The three Ukrainians are still missing." Just eight people have been rescued since the Seti burst its banks near the city of Pokhara, a popular tourist hub, on Saturday, sweeping away an entire village, and swamping families enjoying picnics on the river banks. Most of the missing are thought to be local. One witness,...

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Protecting WWII mass graves is a duty to victims

BUCHAREST (AFP)---Hundreds of Holocaust-era mass graves are scattered around Eastern Europe, scholars said Friday, urging authorities to protect them as they owed it to victims of World War II atrocities. "We cannot build Europe and democracy upon the mass graves of forgotten victims," Patrick Desbois, a French Catholic priest who set up the Yahad-In Unum association, told participants in a seminar on WWII mass graves. The Paris-based association has embarked upon the gruesome task of documenting extermination sites in Ukraine, Belarus, Russia and Poland. "We have received hundreds of letters from people asking: 'in which mass grave is my grand-mother or my uncle buried'," Desbois said. "We have a duty to victims because each and every one of them had a name." A historian with the association, Patrice Bensimon, said that 650 mass-grave sites had been identified on the outskirts of villages, in valleysor forests in the...

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Remains of 23 people found in Turkey mass grave

(AFP) DIYARBAKIR, Turkey — Turkish authorities found the remains of 23 people in a mass grave in mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey on the former site of military police headquarters, Anatolia news agency reported Wednesday. The first remains were discovered earlier this month, during an archeological dig in Ickale, in central Diyarbakir, where ruins of an ancient palace dating back to the 13th century were being excavated. The area had been the site of a military police headquarters until the early 2000s. The eventual aim of the excavation is to carry out restoration work and turn the place into a museum and culture spot. Human rights activists claim the remains belong to civilian Kurds killed by security forces during 1990s. “Skulls and other bones belonging to humans were found here… According to what we saw they were piled up in a narrow place… They were apparently thrown there casually, without any religious ceremony,” Agriculture...

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Short circuit likely behind deadly bus fire in West Sumatra

Police say that a short circuit likely triggered the fire that killed 13 people on board a bus in Hulu Air in Harau district, Limapuluh Kota regency, West Sumatra, on Tuesday. “Witnesses said that the bus suddenly caught fire while passing along Jl. Negara West Sumatra-Riau at Kilometer 30 before entering Payakumbuh. Many of the passengers were trapped inside the bus,” West Sumatra Police spokesman, Adj. Sr. Comr. Mainar Sugiarto, said on Tuesday. Five of the victims, all residents of Agam regency, have been identified as Dariman, 75; Nurhayati, 45; Riski, 7; Rosida, 60; and Yasnimas, 41. Identification of the victims, comprising five women, three men, four children and a toddler, has been hindered due to the conditions of the bodies. Twelve passengers who suffered burns and bone fractures are currently being treated at Adnan Hospital in Payakumbuh, while a further 10 passengers were treated and then released. About 48 people were...

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Ferry disaster: 13 bodies recovered, toll mounts to 122

Rescuers found bodies of 13 victims of Monday’s deadly ferry disaster here pushing the toll to 122 on Thursday while Bangladesh assured Indian authorities of assistance in recovery and repatriation...

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Visegrad Genocide Memories

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Visegrad genocide. For a more easier and quick way of understanding what occurred in 1992, we decided to publish a booklet about the Visegrad genocide. This booklet is entitled: “The memory remains: 20 years since the Visegrad genocide”. The booklet (pdf) can be downloaded h...

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81 men and 3 women were shot in one night in February 1937 What is believed to be the second largest mass grave of people shot by the Franco troops in the Civil War has been revealed in the Málaga village of Teba. The largest such grave is in the San Rafael Cemetery in Málaga. It’s estimated that the grave contains at least 125 bodies, and so far the remains of 35 people have been recovered. The 35 were shot between 1936 and 1949 in Teba. Identification of the bodies is complicated given that the remains have just been dumped on top of each other. It has been decided to construct a pantheon to lay the bodies finally at rest at a site where those who want to pay their respects can do so. This will only happen when the bodies are indentified with DNA, to give the families the chance to bury their loved ones where they wish. Between September 12 and 14 1936, the Franco troops took Teba. Many locals fled looking for the republican front...

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CIUDAD JUAREZ - The identities of nearly 800 skeletal remains found between 2007 and December last year in the state of Chihuahua - 135 in this city - continue to be an unsolved mystery, state authorities said on Tuesday. During a tour of the state's forensic services department in Juárez, technicians said they have obtained genetic profiles of each one of the remains, but they still haven't been able to determine their identities because none of the 791 victims has matched the genetic material samples provided by relatives searching for missing people in the state. The lack of positive matches in these cases means the victims came from other states or countries, or that their relatives never provided a sample of genetic material. Daniel Ricardo Jaramillo, general director of the state's forensic services department, said he has shared the genetic database of the unidentified victims with Mexico's National Human Rights Commission, or...

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