FUNDING FOR MISSING PERSONS AND FORENSICS IN KOSOVO

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 PRISTINA 000480

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

DEPT FOR DRL, INL, EUR/SCE
NSC FOR BRAUN
USUN FOR DREW SCHUFLETOWSKI
EUR/ACE FOR DROGERS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PREL KCRM PGOV PINR KDEM UNMIK YI
SUBJECT: FUNDING FOR MISSING PERSONS AND FORENSICS IN KOSOVO

REF: A. PRISTINA 461


B. 04 PRISTINA 965

C. PRISTINA 265

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SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED, PROTECT ACCORDINGLY


1. (SBU) SUMMARY. As the recent confrontation between police
and families of the missing in Krushe e Vogel/Mala Krusa
demonstrates, missing persons remains a volatile issue in
Kosovo (Ref A). The USG has helped fund both UNMIK's Office
of Missing Persons and Forensics (OMPF) and the Kosovo
operations of the International Commission on Missing Persons
(ICMP),and 1490 sets of human remains have been found,
identified and returned to families. However, known
gravesites are nearly exhausted and leads on new sites hard
to come by. We have clearly hit a point of diminishing
returns regarding recovery of remains, although results could
yet improve should OMPF and ICMP manage to overcome past
difficulties and work in concert. END SUMMARY.

MISSING PERSONS: STILL A MAJOR PROBLEM IN KOSOVO
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2. (SBU) According to witness accounts, the May 25
confrontation between residents and police in Krushe e
Vogel/Mala Krusa started because the Kosovo Albanian
villagers thought they saw former Kosovo Serb neighbors in an
UNMIK convoy, and wanted to ask them about the whereabouts of
their missing relatives (Ref A). Uncertainty about the fate
of missing persons remains a source of anguish to their
families.


3. (SBU) UNMIK's Office of Missing Persons and Forensics
(OMPF) and the International Commission on Missing Persons
(ICMP) agree that there are significant numbers of people
still missing from the Kosovo conflict. According to OMPF
statistics, the number of unresolved missing persons cases
has fallen from 5288 in 2002, when OMPF was created, to 2406
as of May 2006. Of those still missing, OMPF estimates that
1719 are Kosovo Albanians, 503 Kosovo Serbs and 182 are other
minorities.

BACKGROUND
--------------


4. (SBU) OMPF, under UNMIK's Department of Justice (DOJ),
has jurisdiction over missing persons cases as well as all
criminal forensic investigations. OMPF gathers leads and
investigates possible gravesites, conducts exhumations and
autopsies, transfers bone samples to ICMP for DNA extraction
and identification, repatriates bodies to families once they
are identified and keeps family members informed about the
process (Ref B). Under ICMP's 2003 Memorandum of
Understanding (MOU) with OMPF, ICMP collects blood samples
from family members of the missing, and conducts DNA analysis
of bone samples to make identification matches.

RUNNING OUT OF KNOWN GRAVESITES
--------------


5. (SBU) Acting OMPF director Valerie Brasey told E/P Chief,
PolOff and PolFSN on May 24 that apart from one site in
Gjilan/Gniljane that is almost ready for exhumation (pending
final witness site identification and a court order),OMPF
has exhausted all known sites in Kosovo. OMPF field
operations (including all exhumations and assessments) are on
the decline, from 174 in 2002 to 61 in 2005. Similarly, the
number of sets of human remains recovered annually from
within Kosovo has fallen from 443 in 2002 to 118 in 2005.

CONTINUED SLOW PROGRESS ON IDENTIFICATIONS
--------------


6. (SBU) Brasey said that so far in 2006 OMPF has received
238 identification matches back from ICMP, including 100

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matches for remains stored in the OMPF's morgue in
Rahovec/Orahovac. (NOTE. OMPF recently opened a new
facility in Pristina, and is in the process of transferring
its staff, operations and mortal remains. END NOTE.) She
said OMPF has custody of approximately 700 sets of
unidentified remains. ICMP has extracted DNA from 500 of
them, but has not found matches in its existing blood
database. The remaining 200 are either burned or
deteriorated to the extent that ICMP cannot extract DNA.


7. (SBU) If a DNA sample does not come up with a match in
the database, it means that the family members did not donate
blood. OMPF and ICMP agree this could be because the entire
family was killed, or they fled Kosovo and not been found, or
because they received a body which they think is their loved
one, but may have been mis-identified in the chaos
immediately after the conflict. Every such mix-up means
there is one body that cannot be identified in the morgue,
and another family cannot find their loved one, who is buried
under another name.

TRANSFERS FROM SERBIA WILL FINISH THIS MONTH
--------------


8. (SBU) As of December 2005, the Serbian government had
returned 679 sets of remains from mass graves in Serbia.
Brasey said Serbia agreed to transfer the remaining sets of
remains (approximately 70) by the end of June, which OMPF
will then need to sort, autopsy and identify. She said it is
impossible to predict the exact number, due to the condition
of some of the remains. For example, Brasey said the femur
of the son-in-law of Nesrete Kumnova, head of the Provisional
Institutions of Self Government's commission on the missing,
was identified among bodies Serbia recently returned, but the
rest of his body is still missing.

OMPF WANTS 200,000 EUROS FOR OPERATIONS AND TRAINING
-------------- --------------


9. (SBU) On May 24 OMPF presented USOP with a proposal
requesting 200,000 euros, half for exhumation and mortuary
operations, and half to train local staff. (NOTE. USOP has
faxed the proposal to EUR/ACE. END NOTE.) The USG gave OMPF
300,000 USD in 2005 to fund exhumations, and the money
resulted in some major breakthroughs. OMPF has used the
funds frugally, maintaining a roster of qualified
international doctors and specialists to bring to Kosovo as
needed. No USG funding is expressly earmarked for OMPF for
2006 or 2007, although post would like to consider meeting
OMPF's request out of available discretionary funds.


10. (SBU) Brasey said OMPF recently downsized its
international staff from 15 to 10, and is transferring
competencies to local staff. She said OMPF is training some
of the staff from Kosovo's pre-existing Forensic Institute
(under the Department of Health); and is considering a
possible merger with the institute if technical standards
there can be brought up to acceptable levels. She said OMPF
hired two of the institute's doctors and put them through a
one-year post-graduate diploma program in forensic medicine,
but then had to fire one of them (along with a local
UNMIK-trained forensics practitioner) over slander
allegations against OMPF that the UN determined to be
unfounded. Brasey said six more doctors are currently in the
post-grad program, and OMPF will hire three of them after
they graduate in September.

ICMP: FINISHING ITS MANDATE, WANTS TO DO MORE
--------------


11. (SBU) ICMP has requested USD 650,000 in FY 2006 to fund
ongoing expenses, including local salaries, transportation,
heavy equipment rental, international forensic expertise,
blood collection and civil society outreach. In a March 15
email, Kathryne Bomberger, ICMP chief of staff, told PolOff

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that ICMP will complete blood collection this year, and has
already analyzed over 96% of the bone samples it has received
from OMPF. She said ICMP has proposed amendments to the MOU
to allow it to play a greater role in locating and exhuming
gravesites and in local political capacity building (Ref C).


12. (SBU) In a May 25 meeting with RLA, E/P Chief and
PolOff, UNMIK/DOJ Chief Al Moskowitz said he understood that
OMPF and ICMP have not worked well together in the past, but
said all that occurred long before his arrival in Kosovo. He
said he works closely with OMPF, has never heard from ICMP,
and is open to considering any joint efforts the
organizations develop.

ICMP PROPOSALS FOR NEXT STEPS
--------------


13. (SBU) Bomberger told PolOff that during a June 1 meeting
she and Moskowitz discussed practical solutions to resolving
cases and determining areas where ICMP and OMPF can work
together. In response to his concern about whether ICMP data
can be used as evidence in war crimes prosecutions, she said
DNA match reports can be used in court, but ICMP can only
reveal the identity of blood donors if the donor signs a
waiver (which ICMP can help obtain). She said Moskowitz
proposed further discussions directly between ICMP and OMPF,
and he agreed to visit the ICMP headquarters and facilities
in Bosnia.


14. (SBU) Bomberger said ICMP, OMPF and the International
Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC),which chairs the Kosovo
working group on missing persons, should develop a joint
approach to resolving missing persons cases. She suggested
other activities might include obtaining and reviewing war
crimes investigation files from the ICTY, civil police and
national KFOR contingents; establishing an anonymous hotline
to gather leads accompanied by a public information campaign
to publicize the hotline; and creating a high-level
multiethnic commission that would report directly to the
prime minister. She said the commission, like the new
Missing Persons Institute in Bosnia, must be able to credibly
represent victims families of all ethnicities, and serve as a
long-term archive of information related to cases. She said
pre-existing satellite imagery taken by NATO immediately
after the war could be analyzed in conjunction with reliable
witness information to detect land disturbances, but said
this would not be as useful as it was in Bosnia since the
gravesites are smaller.


15. (SBU) Bomberger said ICMP, OMPF and ICRC all have
slightly different lists of missing persons, and these should
be compiled into one definitive list. She said ICMP, OMPF
and ICRC should decide jointly about the extremely sensitive
issue of whether to approach families who might have buried
mis-identified victims.

ICMP AND OMPF AGREE INFORMATION IS NEEDED TO FIND NEW SITES
-------------- --------------


16. Despite past disagreements and personal animosities,
ICMP and OMPF have the same objective: to resolve outstanding
cases and thereby bring much needed closure to the families.
Bomberger and OMPF head Jose Pablo Baraybar both have said
the best way to find more bodies is to obtain information
from the parties to the conflict and from the ICTY, KFOR,
individual NATO military contingents, and the OSCE - who ICMP
and OMPF believe have information in their files about the
location of bodies that were buried or exhumed during the
collection of evidence for war crimes in the immediate
post-war period.

COMMENT
--------------


17. (SBU) OMPF's request for an additional 200,000 euros is a

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reasonable one, and the funding could again be earmarked to
focus specifically on exhumations. ICMP's latest proposals
for activities such as political capacity building, working
with family members and gathering leads complements rather
than obstructs OMPF's more technical work of exhumations, and
could be carried out without amending the MOU. However, ICMP
would be hard-pressed to spend all of its money on such
activities. END COMMENT.


18. (U) Post clears this message in its entirety for
release to Special Envoy Ahtisaari.
GOLDBERG