About 160 bodies exhumed at ISIS massacre site in northern Iraq

Iraqi forensic specialists have found a mass grave containing the remains of about 160 victims of a June 2014 massacre by ISIS Takfiri terrorists at an air force camp in the country’s north-central province of Salahuddin.

Zaid Ali, head of the forensic office, said a joint team from his bureau and the Martyrs Foundation found 158 bodies inside the palace compound of former dictator Saddam Hussein in Tikrit, located 140 kilometers northwest of the capital Baghdad, on Monday.

He noted that DNA tests were being conducted on the corpses in order to identify them.

On June 12, 2014, Daesh terrorists killed around 1,700 Iraqi air force cadets after kidnapping them from Camp Speicher, a former US base. There were reportedly around 4,000 unarmed cadets in the camp when it came under attack by Daesh militants.

Following the abductions, the attackers took the victims to the complex of presidential palaces and killed them. The terrorists also threw some of the bodies into a river.

The massacre was filmed by Daesh and broadcast on social media.

An investigation committee later revealed that 57 members of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath Party aided Takfiri Daesh terrorists in the massacre.

On August 21, 2016, Iraqi judiciary officials hanged 36 men convicted of involvement in the carnage.

Tikrit was recaptured from Daesh in March 2015. During clean-up operations in the northern part of the city, Iraqi forces found the location of the 2014 carnage.

Source: Press TV