The General Authority for Research and Identification of Missing Persons has announced the reburial of 120 unidentified bodies from the devastating floods that struck Derna city in September 2023.
In a Facebook statement, the authority confirmed that the burial process adhered to all necessary legal and religious protocols.
Teams from the authority extracted 80 unidentified bodies from a cemetery in Derna over a two-day period, subjecting them to forensic examination.
Under the directive of the Attorney General’s Office, this initiative aims to continue the search for missing persons, identify them, and repatriate their remains to their families.
Samples for DNA testing were collected from 140 bodies before their reburial to facilitate identification and reunification with relatives.
On September 10, a severe storm swept through several eastern regions of Libya, including Derna, Benghazi, Al-Bayda, Al-Marj, and Sousse, resulting in significant destruction and causing numerous casualties and disappearances.
A joint report by the World Bank, United Nations, and European Union described Libya’s deadly flash flood in September as a climate and environmental catastrophe necessitating $1.8 billion in reconstruction and recovery efforts.
The report highlighted that the disaster impacted approximately 1.5 million people, equivalent to 22% of Libya’s population. According to Reuters, figures from the U.N. humanitarian agency OCHA reported 4,352 confirmed deaths with 8,000 individuals still missing.
The report attributed the collapse of dams partly to outdated hydrological information used in their design and partly to poor maintenance and governance issues during Libya’s conflict.
