Armenia buys new equipment to identify bodies of killed soldiers
24.12.2020,
15:29
Armenian government has purchased new equipment to identify the bodies of those killed during the Artsakh war, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said during a government meeting on Thursday.
YEREVAN, December 24. /ARKA/. Armenian government has purchased new equipment to identify the bodies of those killed during the Artsakh war, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said during a government meeting on Thursday.
He said the most urgent task for today is the repatriation of captured Armenian POWs and civilians and the fate of the missing persons.
According to him, the government is working in this direction on a daily basis and there are issues that cannot be presented publicly, since this can complicate and damage the process.
“There is also a process that is very difficult to talk about publicly, but it should be noted that the process of identifying the bodies of the killed soldiers on the basis of DNA tests is underway. To speed up the process, the Ministry of Health purchased new equipment, which is already on its way to Armenia. We expect it to arrive and be launched in the coming days,” Pashinyan said.
Minister of Health Arsen Torosyan added that the new equipment will allow to double the ministry's capacity. 'This is a very complex process, therefore it is long-term, but we have already automated many procedures, due to which today 10 times more research is carried out per day than before the war,” Torosyan said.
The Prime Minister also expressed concern over the fact that, according to some relatives of the missing soldiers, there were several cases where, after identification, discrepancies were subsequently revealed.
Torosyan said the discrepancies resulted from haste, when the identification was carried out visually, and after a DNA test it turned out that it was unreliable.
“We do not present the results until there is 100% confidence in the results of DNA testing,” Torosyan said. -0-
He said the most urgent task for today is the repatriation of captured Armenian POWs and civilians and the fate of the missing persons.
According to him, the government is working in this direction on a daily basis and there are issues that cannot be presented publicly, since this can complicate and damage the process.
“There is also a process that is very difficult to talk about publicly, but it should be noted that the process of identifying the bodies of the killed soldiers on the basis of DNA tests is underway. To speed up the process, the Ministry of Health purchased new equipment, which is already on its way to Armenia. We expect it to arrive and be launched in the coming days,” Pashinyan said.
Minister of Health Arsen Torosyan added that the new equipment will allow to double the ministry's capacity. 'This is a very complex process, therefore it is long-term, but we have already automated many procedures, due to which today 10 times more research is carried out per day than before the war,” Torosyan said.
The Prime Minister also expressed concern over the fact that, according to some relatives of the missing soldiers, there were several cases where, after identification, discrepancies were subsequently revealed.
Torosyan said the discrepancies resulted from haste, when the identification was carried out visually, and after a DNA test it turned out that it was unreliable.
“We do not present the results until there is 100% confidence in the results of DNA testing,” Torosyan said. -0-
