By end of April the Committee on Missing Persons in Cyprus (CMP) will have identified a number of remains, Leonidas Pantelides, Greek Cypriot Member in the Committee told the Cyprus News Agency on Saturday.
He said that some of these remains were exhumed recently and some others a few years back.
Pantelides explained that once the remains are located and the excavations and exhumations are completed, the identification process might take a while and sometimes a few attempts are made at the laboratory for the identification to be carried out completely. He also said that the identifications to be made in the next days are not related to remains found in 2021.
He also said that since the families have not been notified yet, he does not want to say how many identifications will be announced or where the remains were found.
Pantelides told the CNA that there is a total number of approximately 200 remains right now at the anthropological laboratory which are yet to be identified. He explained that some of these remains might never be identified as they are not related to missing persons or are archaeological findings.
According to the Greek Cypriot CMP member, for a number of 35-40 remains the process is making good progress and there is hope and optimism that they will be identified. Another 40 remains or so belong to a second category and there is also hope that at some point there will be results from the process and some 70 or so remains are most probably related to archaeological findings and although a detailed process was carried out, there were no results.
He also explained that in some cases there is a very small fraction of bone that is found and no DNA can be obtained and therefore no identification can be conducted. There are also cases were the DNA from the families is not adequate.
According to Pantelides the last few months no announcements were made as the work of the CMP was put to a halt due to the pandemic. But now the works have resumed and at the end of each month announcements will be made on the progress of the identification process.
He once again urged people to come forward with any piece of information they have on missing persons pointing out that any information is valuable for the CMP and might confirm or modify any prior briefing it had on a case.
He added that there are cases were the archaeologists start to dig at a specific location and neighbours or other interested parties come forward with some new information that might assist them in their work. Pantelides said that most of the reports are related to the location where a missing person was last seen or was seen dead, but the CMP is interested on the burial site.
He also said that there are cases were the remains were reburied and only small fractions of bones are located but the CMP needs to find and exhume all the remains to be given back to the families for a proper burial.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkish troops invaded and occupied 37% of its territory. Since then, the fate of hundreds of people remains unknown.
A Committee on Missing Persons has been established, upon agreement between the leaders of the two communities, with the scope of exhuming, identifying and returning the remains of missing persons to their relatives.