Iraq discovers 80 bodies at Camp Speicher carnage site

Iraqi forensic specialists have reportedly found the remains of some 80 victims of the June 2014 massacre by Takfiri Daesh terrorists at an air force camp in the country’s north-central province of Salahuddin.

Fazel al-Qarawi, a human rights specialist, told Arabic-language al-Forat news agency on Tuesday that experts from the Iraqi Establishment of Martyrs and Health Ministry found 80 bodies inside former dictator Saddam Hussein’s palace compound in Tikrit, located 140 kilometers northwest of the capital Baghdad.

The remains of the victims’ bodies, which were found submerged in Tigris River under tree branches, were brought out by a group of divers and transferred to the provincial department of forensic sciences for DNA testing.

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 the 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 hung 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.

Iraqi armed forces are now engaged in a large-scale military operation in Mosul to rid the terror group of its last remaining stronghold in the Arab country.