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In 2002, PHR investigators first confirmed the presence of human remains in a mass grave at Dasht-e-Leili, outside of the city of Sheberghan in Jowzjan Province, northern Afghanistan. Six and a half years later, in 2008, Stefan Schmitt, Director of PHR’s International Forensic Program, was in Afghanistan under contract with United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) to conduct forensic assessments on several different grave sites in the country. In an effort to re-visit sites which had been originally documented in 2002, Schmitt visited Dasht-e-Leili. In contrast to 2002, Schmitt, came upon two sizeable pits which had disturbed the area originally documented in 2002—indicative of apparent evidence tampering. Schmitt raised concerns about the state of the alleged massacre site in meetings with UN and Afghan officials in Kabul.

McClatchy Newspapers subsequently reported that the UN team

first spotted two large excavations on a visit in June, one of them about 100 feet long and more than 9 feet deep in places. A McClatchy reporter visited the site last month [November 2008] and found three additional smaller pits, which apparently had been dug since June.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science recounts (PDF) that

In May 2009 PHR requested that the Science and Human Rights Program of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) research and acquire available satellite imagery of the area to determine when two the sizeable pits possibly comprising the graves might have first appeared.  Working with PHR’s International Forensic Program, the AAAS located and analyzed multiple images of the site acquired by the QuickBird, Ikonos, TopSat, and SPOT-5 satellites.

Satellite imagery analysis provided by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) revealed that apparent earth-moving equipment was present at the site on August 5, 2006. The image shows the presence of one large pit and apparent earth-moving equipment in a second area. A subsequent satellite image from October 24, 2007 reveals a second pit where the apparent earth-moving equipment had been.

On June 21, 2006, PHR made an extensive Freedom of Information Act request for all information relating to occurrences on and around November 2001 in the region of Dasht-e-Leili. PHR submitted the FOIA request simultaneously with the Department of Defense (including the Department of the Air Force, the Department of the Navy, and US Central Command), the Department of State (including the War Crimes Office) and the Central Intelligence Agency.

It appears that within just a little over a month of PHR’s Freedom of Information Act request, two large pits were excavated in the general area where human remains are suspected to be buried. The contents (fill) of these pits was taken away to an unknown location, and considering the size of the pits, this must have taken many truck loads.

The AAAS report (PDF) is now publicly available. Images from the report are available on AfghanMassGrave.org, on PHR’s Flickr account and as a .kml file, which can be viewed in Google Earth. AAAS has also issued a statement regarding its report.

Filed in documents and materials and tagged: AAAS , air force , american association for the advancement of science , central intelligence agency , department of defense , department of state , foia , freedom of information act , ikonos , jowjzan province , kabul , mcclatchy newspapers , navy , quickbird , satellite images , sheberghan , spot-5 , stefan shmitt , topsat , unama , us central command , war crimes office

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