Masters student Sophie van Wyngaarden has flown to the war-torn Balkan state of Kosovo to join a team of investigators led by Murdoch’s Associate Professor James Speers, as they probe war-time homicides in the region.

Miss van Wyngaarden is the first of several Murdoch students to join Professor Speers at Kosovo’s National Institute of Forensic Medicine (IFM), working with a team of forensic anthropology and archaeology experts.

The Masters of Forensic Science student will spend three months working with Professor Speers and with Professor Flamur Blakaj, from the IFM, in examining ways to compare homicide deaths in Kosovo to other European countries between 2005 and 2017.

Professor Speers has been in the Balkan state training staff to find human remains in Kosovo as part of efforts to identify missing persons from the 1998-99 war. He will work in Kosovo for up to three years on a FIFO basis, and is hoping to bring more Master of Forensic Science students from Murdoch across for internships.

He said the internships would provide students with an invaluable insight into the complicated workings of post-war alliances and the critical nature of intelligence reports.

Working through post-war alliances

Miss van Wyngaarden said she felt privileged to be the first person chosen to join Professor Speers and the IFM team for three months.

“Unearthing and presenting the truth is a role so vital not only to proving guilt but also innocence,” Miss van Wyngaarden said. “I personally realise the profound importance of providing peace of mind, closure and hopefully justice to the families of the victims.

“Although born in Australia I have lost family to war in Germany, France and Ireland. I understand the impact of grief and loss on loved ones, communities and their countries.”

Professor Speers has been working with forensic experts from the European Union and staff from IFM to painstakingly excavate a potential grave site recently identified near the Kosovo-Albanian border.

The group has been able to identify a number of human bones ranging from an adolescent boy to a number of old men.

Reconciliation process vital

“Although it is a difficult process, it is critical for families to recover their loved ones,” Professor Speers said. “Sadly in some cases, whole families have been killed and it may not be possible to reconcile the victims. But it is important to know for sure.

“The Kosovo government sees this as vital to the reconciliation process and so I have met with them a number of times to accelerate the project.”

Professor Speers said the process of finding the mass graves was long and complex, and since 2014, only two have been found and excavated so far in Kosovo.

“It is suspected that to hide alleged ‘war crimes’, Serbian and Albanian forces removed bodies from Kosovo for reburial in unmarked graves in their respective countries,” he said. “So it might be that there are only a few grave sites in Kosovo.”

Professor Speers was head-hunted to lead the project to advance the IFM Kosovo to international standards because of his previous experience investigating terrorism in Northern Ireland and his work on similar tasks in other post conflict areas like Jordan and Palestine.