The New York Times

Monday, September 13, 1999

Bosnian Mass Graves Exhumed

By The Associated Press

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) -- The Muslim Commission for Missing Persons started new exhumations Monday at several mass grave sites in Bosnia, a local official said.

"We are expecting to find several hundred Muslim bodies, mostly civilians," a deputy head of the commission, Jasmin Odobasic, told The Associated Press on Monday.

The exhumations will be conducted in the area near Srebrenica, site of the war's worst massacre, where some 7,000 people were killed.

Other sites include the eastern town of Foca, where more than 1,000 Muslims were executed; the northwestern town of Prijedor, where several concentration camps for Muslims and Croats were located; and an area near the southern town of Gacko.

All these sites are under Bosnian Serb control and it is believed that victims were killed by Serb military units during the 1992-95 Bosnian war.

Since the war ended, more than 4,000 bodies have been exhumed in Bosnia, Odobasic said.

Estimates are that some 200,000 people were killed in the Bosnian war, and international experts say more than 24,000 people are still missing.