Maximizing Efforts for the Identification of Remains of Missing Persons and Addressing the Needs of Families: Executive Summary

From 26 to 28 February 2020, 130 participants from more than 15 contexts came together to Tbilisi to discuss the issue of long-standing unidentified human remains. Participants included international experts in the fields of forensics, law and public policy as well as family members from the various contexts of the region, members of civil society and representatives from government agencies in Georgia. The purpose of this discussion was to shed light on the underlying reasons behind the problem of long-term unidentified remains, to draw parallels between different contexts and to showcase good practices and methodologies from different parts of the world that yielded positive results. Crucially, the conference aimed to bring into focus the perspective of the families on this issue and to take recognize their expectations and wishes on how such caseloads are to be managed. This executive summary provides a high-level overview of the insightful discussions and presents a set of recommendations that, if properly implemented, could significantly enhance case resolution.