616 BODIES OF GENOCIDE VICTIMS EXUMED FROM MASS GRAVE IN KAMENICA

KAMENICA, Bosnia (November 23,2007) - The Bosnian forensic experts completed yesterday the excavation of a mass grave at Kamenica-9 location near the eastern Bosnian town of Zvornik and unearthed the remains of 616 genocide victim, the Bosnian Commission For Missing Persons confirmed.

The Bosnian village of Kamenica lies in an area nicknamed "Death Valley". Nine mass graves have been found there, containing remains of many of the 10,000 Bosnian civilians mass murdered by the genocidal Serbian aggressor in the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica in the last months of the 1992-95 Serbian aggression against Bosnia.

"We found 76 complete and 540 incomplete bodies," said Ismet Music, an official of the Bosnian Commission For Missing Persons, standing on the edge of a muddy grave where white-clad forensic pathologists cleaned up bones.

Some bodies of genocide victims are very well preserved due to an extraordinary microclimate in the grave. Music said some faces were almost intact, with eyes staring wide open.

"It was quite a horrifying sight," he said.

Documents found at the newly-excavated site and on many of the bodies reveal their identities.The genocide victims were Bosnian civilians from Srebrenica. Bodies of genocide victims have been unearthed with eyes blindfolded, hands bound, and bullet wounds.

The exhumed remains of genocide victims will be sent for DNA analysis to the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) in the northern Bosnian city of Tuzla, for identification.

Nearly 3,600 complete and incomplete bodies of genocide victims from Srebrenica have so far been exhumed from 10 mass graves in the Kamenica valley.

The Bosnian forensic experts also announced the possibility of opening a new mass grave at another location in Kamenica soon.