The second stage of the Humanitarian Project Plan (HPP) on the identification of the Argentine soldiers who gave their lives for the recovery of the exercise of national sovereignty in the Malvinas Islands began in the archipelago on August 9.
Within the framework of the tasks carried out by the forensic team of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to identify the ex-combatants buried in Grave C.1.10. of the Darwin Cemetery, the remains of at least five people were preliminarily found.
The samples taken from the remains exhumed by the ICRC team were transferred last August 26 on a private flight to the city of Córdoba. In the laboratory of the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team (LGF-EAAF) based in that city, they will be analyzed and compared against DNA samples provided by relatives in an attempt to identify them. The results of these tests are expected in late October.
“On behalf of the Argentine Government, I want to thank the Red Cross for the enormous effort it has made to start this second stage of the humanitarian project in the Darwin Cemetery, in Grave C.1.10. For Argentina, it is the continuity of a true State policy initiated in 2012 during the government of Cristina Fernández”, said the Secretary for the Malvinas Islands, Antarctica and South Atlantic, Daniel Filmus, during a press conference he held at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs together with the Secretary of Justice, Juan Martín Mena, in reference to the progress of the HPP.
On his part, Mena noted: "This work is one of the most moving humanitarian projects of recent years regarding the identification of Argentine soldiers who were not identified in the Darwin Cemetery."
The Second Humanitarian Project Plan was signed on March 18, 2021, when the governments of the Argentine Republic and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland agreed that the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) carry out the identification of the remains of unidentified Argentine soldiers buried in Grave C.1.10.
Last July, the Argentine ambassador to the International Organizations in Geneva, Federico Villegas, his British counterpart, Simon Manley, and the vice president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Gilles Carbonnier, signed the international instruments that allowed progress in the search and identification of a possible temporary war grave in Caleta Trullo. The search tasks were carried out days ago but did not yield results, ruling out the existence of a grave in that area.
With the same humanitarian perspective as the first Humanitarian Project Plan begun in 2012, these agreements aim to identify the remains of Argentine soldiers who fought for the recovery of the exercise of national sovereignty in the Malvinas and lost their lives on the islands, as well as to provide answers to their families as to where to honor their loved ones.
