ZAGREB, September 18, 2019 – A meeting with 30 representatives of missing persons family associations from Croatia was organised in Zagreb on Tuesday by the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) with the participation of representatives of the Croatian Veterans Ministry’s Directorate for Detained and Missing Defenders.
This was the second in a series of meetings with families of the missing, organised to share information about the missing persons process on the territory of the former Yugoslavia, the ICMP said in a press release, adding that the first meeting was held with families from Bosnia and Herzegovina in January 2019.
The meetings are part of a two-year project supported by the UK government and being implemented by ICMP to renew the effort to account for 12,000 people who are still missing throughout the region, the press release said, adding that countries in the region have undertaken to work together as the regional Missing Persons Group, maintaining a process that has already made it possible to account for more than 70 percent of the missing.
Information on new initiatives and implemented activities to strengthen regional cooperation was presented at the meeting.
Families were informed about the Database of Active Missing Persons Cases from the Armed Conflicts in the Former Yugoslavia, the enactment of the Law on Persons Missing from the Homeland War, efforts undertaken to identify unidentified remains, and other activities in accounting for missing persons.
Croatian War Veterans Ministry representatives said lack of information on concealed mass and individual graves was the key obstacle to greater efficiency in the process.
Participants highlighted the need to involve families more widely in discussions on the issue of missing persons at the international level.
Families also appealed to institutions and individuals in the region to provide information on the location of mass and individual graves in order to help address this painful issue, the ICMP said.
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