Iraq
The remains of 11 Iraqi soldiers being repatriated to their homeland in October 2021 under the auspices of the ICRC. File photo/ICRC
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - An official from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Wednesday that more than 52,000 Iraqi and around 12,000 Iranian soldiers have remained missing, nearly four decades since the end of the eight-year-long bloody war between the two neighboring countries.
"The process of exchanging the remains of missing [soldiers] between Iraq and Iran has been ongoing per a trilateral mechanism, on the basis of a memoranda of understanding signed in 2008, with international committee of the red cross facilitating to identify the missing and return their remains to their families between the two countries," Avin Yasin, media officer of the Erbil office of the ICRC, told Rudaw on Wednesday.
Former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s Baathist Iraq and the newly-formed Islamic Republic of Iran fought a devastating war more than three decades ago, from 1980 to 1988, during which about one million lives from each side were lost.
Tehran and Baghdad in 2008 signed an agreement under the auspices of the ICRC regarding the exchange of information and handing over remains of missing persons during the war. The remains of hundreds of soldiers have been returned since then.
Iraq and Iran have so far exchanged the remains of 5,324 soldiers, with the majority of them, numbering 4,213 being Iraqis.
Yasin added that joint committees frequently conduct field searches.
"Legal measures are being undertaken after the remains are found. Once they are identified, the exchange process will be done by Iraq's defense ministry, under the auspices of the international red cross," she explained.
She went on to say "the latest exchange of remains took place on October 5 which included 70 Iraqi soldiers and 40 Iranian soldiers through the Shalamcheh border crossing."
The ICRS has facilitated the exchange of over 5,300 remains of the war between Iraq and Iran since 2010, the media officer said.
"There are still thousands of families out there who know nothing about the whereabouts of their loved ones," she said. "We will continue to support the relevant sides to give an answer to their families."
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