The site discovered at al-Mahawil, near the city of Hilla, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, appeared to be among the largest found in Iraq since Saddam Hussein's government was toppled by the US-led invasion. The relatives of those who have been missing since a Shiite uprising in was suppressed have been desperately searching for the remains of their loved ones, using tractors and their bare hands to dig in the soil.
Rafid al-Husseini, a local Iraqi doctor trying to organise the retrieval of decomposed bodies at al-Mahawil, told the BBC that so far they have found the remains of more than 3, people. He expects many more. Relatives are identifying them from their glasses or other personal effects found among the bodies. The BBC quoted unidentified human rights groups as saying the graves could contain 10, to 15, bodies.
The Iraqi National Congress, a London-based opposition group close to the US military, also said the site could contain about 15, bodies. Once dug up, the decomposing limbs and skulls are gathered in piles or put in plastic bags. Some relatives are able to put a name to the remains thanks to identity cards found nearby, but others are left to guess from recognising pieces of clothing, glasses or other personal effects. Human rights groups have criticised British and US forces for failing to preserve the site to provide evidence for future prosecutions.
Those criticisms were echoed by Labour MP Ann Clwyd, a long-standing campaigner whose organisation Indict has pushed for members of Saddam Hussein's regime to be brought to justice. It would be tragic if the victims and the families of these victims did not get justice because the evidence has been destroyed. Saddam Hussein's former head of protocol, Haitham Rashid Wihaib, said he believed the grisly discoveries at al-Mahawil were evidence of a "crime against humanity" and justified the war on Iraq.
So this really justifies the war against Iraq. Mr Wihaib said the location of mass graves was widely known in Iraq but talking about them could result in execution under the former regime. Over the last 20 years, Amnesty International has collected information on about 17, people believed to have disappeared in Iraq but the actual figure may be much higher. Iraqis who claim to have witnessed mass executions across the country are now helping unearth mass grave sites in Najaf, Basra, Babylon and other areas.
