The 30 August marks the International Day of the Disappeared. It is a good opportunity to raise awareness of this very sensitive and very important issue. EULEX understands the anguish and anxiety that is felt by families with missing relatives. We also understand the desperation that this uncertainty creates in their lives. We also recognize that reconciliation and the full reconstruction of the social fabric in society cannot be fully achieved until answers regarding the missing are provided to the affected families and to civil society.

This is why EULEX experts at the Office of the Missing Persons and Forensics (OMPF) together with their local colleagues are working intensively to find answers about this crucially important issue. The complexity of the challenges ahead prevents the possibility of rapid solutions. Nevertheless, EULEX, since becoming operational, has taken significant action to determine the fate of the remaining missing in Kosovo.

Since December 2008, EULEX has completed 88 field operations, 45 exhumations, taken 405 bone samples for DNA analysis, exhumed 66 individuals, had 61 family visits, handed over 61 deceased remains to families.”