They brought the bodies back in silence and with no names. Whole families waited, hearts thrust forward, hoping, against the odds, that the figures carried in the crates might at last be their missing prisoners. Mothers pressed their faces to the sheets of paper, convinced that a familiar scar, a crooked tooth or the shape of a jaw would betray the identity that official lists refused to give. One woman said if she were allowed to draw near, her heart would tell her the truth even if only dust and bone remained.

Relatives describe coffins that bear the marks of a cruelty that words struggle to hold: signs of binding, evidence of dissection, and, as those examining the remains reported, internal cavities filled with cotton. Doctors who examined the returned bodies documented wounds and handling consistent with deliberate mistreatment. For the bereaved, this is not merely an act of violence but another chapter in a genocidal war that continues to fracture lives and erase names. Those who wait speak of stolen identities as much as stolen lives, the humiliation of anonymous return, of being given fragments where a name should be.

Among the thousands who wait, many still whisper one name aloud: Amer. Loved ones ask whether there is any real chance he might be among the unidentified. They cling to memory, the turn of an ear, the way someone laughed, and to the fragile hope that science, or a mother’s certainty, will reunite name and body. As families press for answers, the central demand is plain: recognise the dead as persons, restore their names, and stop burying the truth beneath silence.