Four Georgian victims of Babushera tragedy identified
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Four bodies unearthed at Babushera’s mass grave in Georgia’s breakaway Abkhazia region have been identified, enabling a Georgian woman who has dressed in black for the past 21 years to finally give her loved ones a proper burial.
Today, Bela Zaldastanishvili - whose world shattered on September 22, 1993 when she lost her two sons and both twin brothers in a plane crash – was informed that authorities had managed to identify the bodies of her deceased family members as a result of a DNA analysis.
Bela Zaldastanishvili lost two sons and two brothers in the plane crash; Photo by N. Alavidze / Agenda.ge
The bodies will soon be returned to the family.
On December 9, the soldiers who died during accomplishing a military mission will lay in state at the country’s main cathedral, the Holy Trinity Cathedral, where Georgians will be able to pay their respects. After this the bodies will be reburied at the Doghomi Brother’s Cemetery in Tbilisi.
On September 22, 1993, a plane flying from Tbilisi to Sokhumi – capital city of Abkhazia - was shot down while attempting to land at Babushera Airport. The aircraft crashed on the runway, killing 108 of the 132 people on board.
See a multimedia story about the victims and survivors of the tragedy here.
The tragic crash came four days before the 13-month war in Abkhazia ended.
The flight was carrying soldiers and doctors who were on a humanitarian mission. Those on board were planning to help civilians in Sokhumi and take the wounded back to Tbilisi.
Zaldastanishvili’s two sons and two brothers were on board that plane. All four of them – Zura (23), Temuri (25), Nukri (30) and Vasiko (30) - died.
A photo on a wall at Zaldastanishvili's home; Photo by N. Alavidze / Agenda.ge
The families of those killed in the plane crash could not retrieve the bodies of their loved ones because of the unrest in the area. The scale of the damage meant it was impossible to identify the bodies following the crash without DNA testing.
After the plane crash the war continued in Sokhumi but it was urgent to bury the bodies. Subsequently, those who died were buried in a mass grave without being formally identified.
Exactly 21 years on from the Babushera tragedy, the bodies of all Georgians who died in the crash were finally returned home.
Authorities began to excavate the graves at Babushera Cemetery in May 2014 following lengthy negotiations between Georgia and Abkhazia.
International humanitarian aid group Red Cross helped facilitate cooperation between de-facto Abkhaz authorities and Georgian officials. The graves of the unknown victims were opened and DNA samples were taken from all the bodies. The samples were then sent to Zagreb, Croatia, to be analysed. Some DNA testing is still underway.
Once all the remains are identified, the bodies will be returned to their families and reburied in Georgia. The victims will finally be laid to rest in peace.
A meeting between Georgian and representatives of the de-facto Government of beakaway Abkhazia met face-to-face and agreed to excavate cemeteries in Georgia and Abkhazia and return victims of the Abkhaz crisis to their hometowns.
Georgian officials from the Ministry of Internally Displaced Persons from the Occupied Territories, Accommodation and Refugees of Georgia are heading abroad to speed up the process of returning the bodies of the victims of the Abkhazia crisis(1992-1994) back to Georgia.
The bodies of 31 Georgians who died in a plane crash in Abkhazia have returned home, 21 years on from the tragedy.
It's been 21 years since the Babushera tragedy in Abkhazia and the bodies of thirteen Georgians who died in the crash are finally being returned home. A plane carrying more than 120 people from Tbilisi was shot down while landing at Babushera Airport in Sokhumi on September 20, 1993, during the Abkhaz war.
Excavation of Georgian remains found in a mass grave in Abkhazia at Sokhumi’s Babushera Airport in September 1993 has begun, with authorities hoping to identify the remains and return the bodies’ home to Georgia.
Four soldiers who died in a plane crash while on a military mission 21 years ago have been buried with full military honours at the Digomi Brothers’ Cemetery today.
Georgian Ministry of Refugees officials and representatives of the de-facto Abkhazian government met today under the auspices of the International Red Cross Commission where they discussed issues relating to the searching and transferring of bodies of those missing since the Georgia-Abkhazian conflict in the early 1990s.
The bodies of 12 Georgians found in mass grave in Abkhazia, at Sokhumi’s Babushera Airport have been identified and returned to their loved ones for an honourable burial.
Georgia’s Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili has appealed to anyone having information on people who went missing due to the 1992-1993 war in Abkhazia region and 2008
Russia-Georgia war to inform the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
25 Georgian heroes who lost their lives in the Abkhaz war in 1993 who have been recently identified and transported to the capital of Tbilisi were buried today. Georgia’s Prime Minister thanked the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Abkhazian side for their support in finding and identifying the people who died in the war.
The body of Mikheil Jincharadze who died in the fight in the town of Gagra, Abkhazia in 1992 was brought home 25 years after his death thanks to the efforts by the Georgian government and his own relatives living in Abkhazia.