Ukraine to set up single body to deal with body identification amid war

As Ukrinform reported with reference to the Department of Communications of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, this was stated by the Commissioner for Persons Gone Missing in Special Circumstances, Artur Dobroserdov, during a conference in Kyiv.

Dobroserdov reported that active communication is underway with international organizations to improve interaction and receive assistance. He also noted that a Single Center for Body (Remains) Identification is currently being created, and therefore the introduction of a single unified registry of bodies remains an important issue.

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According to Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs Leonid Tymchenko, there is currently a large number of unidentified bodies, therefore, coordinated work of all structural units, investigators, and experts is required to ensure that the work on identifying the bodies does not st at any one of the stages.

“The Ministry of Internal Affairs continues to strengthen the capabilities of expert services, trains new specialists to more quickly identify the bodies of defenders brought to Ukraine through the repatriation mechanism,” he noted.

Head of the Expert Service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Serh Krymchuk, said that over the past year, more than 100 new experts have joined the Ministry’s specialized laboratories. He stated that the dynamics of their work has improved.

In addition, representatives from the National Pice, General Staff of the Armed Forces, Ministry of Health, Security Service of Ukraine, and Prosecutor General’s Office discussed issues that arise in the process of identifying repatriated bodies (remains).

According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in 2022-2023, five forensic medical examination bureaus were invved in identifying the bodies, and in 2024, examinations of repatriated bodies (remains) were carried out in 19 such bureaus.

Deputy Minister of Health Ihor Kuzin said among the priority issues for 2025 was upgrading the forensic medical examination bureaus.

As reported, on January 24, a total of 757 bodies (remains) of fallen sdiers were repatriated.