5/17/2003: Mass grave grief

MS-NBC's week in pics had a bunch from this week's finding of mass graves in Iraq, from a 1991 Shiite uprising against Hussein. This was the most spell-binding of them because it shows so much. The strangely clear plastic bags that hold what little remains the graves cough up. The grief that can still go on after twelve years - put away somewhere, surely, buried, and now unearthed. It's frightening in how real it is.

The 'Ewwww' factor of this pic is off the scale

Seriously, I wonder how they go about identifying remains that have been buried in mass graves for 12 years. Seems impossible. Unless they get mummified by the desert or something.

Horrific it is indeed.

     Does anyone know how they identified the bodies?
     Not to be disturbing or anything but I can't help but wonder if the body in this mans lap belonged to the person he believes it did. The fact that this appears to be a child's body makes this man's pain immeasurable to me. The thought that he might have the wrong body just chills me.

In another one of the shots, they had a mangled old identification card with a picture. It might have been buried with the body, I'm not sure.

My god, that is such a sad picture.

Apparently a lot of the bodies have identifying tags. There has been a conflict between human rights groups, who are complaining that the deaths aren't being properly identified and cataloged and information is being lost (that might later be used to bring charges against the perps, for example) and the relatives of the dead, who just want to take the remains home with them for 'proper' burial and to hell with the formalities. I can see the case on both sides, and I don't think there's a truly right answer to this one.

Aww, that's so touching and sad!

I cried. I wanted to reach out and try to help him.

Sometimes I wonder if grief isn't the strongest emotion...

Grief the strongest?

Wait untill the rage from the grief shows its head.

Heartbreaking. It could be an adult or child, bundled and embraced, beloved and in need of comfort.