Georgian, Abkhaz participants meet in İstanbul talks on persons missing from Abkhazia war
The body added 526 human remains had been found and recovered, with 273 identified and handed over to their families for burial, as a result of the work of the coordination mechanism, and noted the outcome was made possible by joint efforts and “active involvement” of the participants. Photo: Georgian State Ministry for Reconciliation and Civic Equality
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The Georgian State Ministry for Reconciliation and Civic Equality on Friday said a meeting involving Georgian and Abkhaz participants for finding and determining the fate of missing individuals from the 1992-1993 armed conflict in Georgia’s Russian-occupied Abkhazia region was hosted in İstanbul.
Chaired by the neutral moderator of the International Committee of the Red Cross, the 15th meeting of the coordination mechanism emphasised the need to find further information about the graves of missing people and challenges related to the identification process.
The Ministry said the participants exchanged information to facilitate further search and identification process and agreed on “practical steps” to increase efforts to collect and exchange information, and accelerate search for missing persons.
The body added 526 human remains had been found and recovered, with 273 identified and handed over to their families for burial, as a result of the work of the coordination mechanism, and noted the outcome was made possible by joint efforts and “active involvement” of the participants.
It also said 1,870 people were considered missing from the conflict, with their families “anxiously waiting for concrete answers and an end to years of uncertainty”.
Under the ICRC's auspices, the coordination mechanism was formed in 2010 to handle issues related to determining the fate of the missing individuals. The Ministry noted a “fully humanitarian dialogue” between the participants and their “continued” involvement in the mechanism was “crucial” in the effort.
The conflict in the northwestern region began on August 14, 1992 and took the lives of between 13,000 to 20,000 ethnic Georgians and approximately 3,000 Abkhaz before it ended on September 27, 1993.
Over 250,000 Georgians fled the region and became internally displaced in the country, while more than 2,000 - including about 1,500 ethnic Georgians, up to 200 ethnic Abkhaz and about 100 ethnic Ossetians - were declared missing in the aftermath of the war.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili and Government members on Thursday paid tribute to 23 victims of the 1990s armed conflict in the now Russian-occupied Abkhazia region after their remains were transferred to Tbilisi on Wednesday.
The remains of 23 individuals who had been missing since the 1992-1993 armed conflict in Georgia’s now Russian-occupied Abkhazia region were handed over to their families on Wednesday, in the latest stage of the process involving the Government and the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili on Wednesday said peace was “the foundation upon which a united, strong and developed country should be built” together with the “Abkhazian and Ossetian brothers”, in comments marking the 30th anniversary of the fall of Sokhumi, the capital of the Russian-occupied north-western region of Abkhazia during the war in the region in 1993.
A meeting between Georgian and Abkhaz participants was hosted on Tuesday in Belgrade to discuss ongoing efforts to account for 1,941 people missing from the 1992-1993 armed conflict in Georgia’s Russian-occupied Abkhazia region.
The remains of 13 people who went missing during the 1992–93 armed conflict in Georgia’s Russia-occupied Abkhazia region have been identified and returned to their families. It was possible to identify the bodies of eight military servicemen and five civilians through the joint efforts of the Georgian State Ministry for Reconciliation and Civic Equality and the International Committee of the Red Cross.