Experts to assess the Tuam burial site

Minister appoints forensic team to locate babies

THE Children’s Minster has appointed a team of international forensic experts to determine if there should be a full excavation of the burial site of the Tuam mother and baby home.

Minister Katherine Zappone was speaking in the Dáil yesterday and said there was a consensus about recovering the children’s remains and identifying them.

The Mother and Baby Homes Commission has established that a ‘significant quantity of human remains’ were found at the home following an excavation that began late last year.

The discovery was made after local historian Catherine Corless uncovered the names of the 796 children who were buried in a mass grave between 1925 and Work: Katherine Zappone 1961. Yesterday the minister said she had established a team of international forensic experts headed by forensic archaeologist Niamh McCullagh

Ms Zappone said: ‘This is hugely technical work we needed to find the best people for the job – even deciding to look for technical expertise was an important decision.

‘We will have this technical expertise to us in common language so we can understand this.’

The minster’s announcement follows a lengthy meeting last month with Ms Corless and the survivors and family members of the children who died in the home.

Ms Corless has always claimed there are children buried beyond the small green site within a housing estate in Tuam.

Speaking to the Irish Daily Mail, Ms Corless said: ‘We are moving forward. Minister Zappone has brought it a step forward from the internal memo.

‘She got the support to do this and has come forward.

‘She will know from their expertise whether it is possible to excavate the area.

‘I am hoping they will still do a scan of the whole area and find all the children... They all need to be found’.

The minister said one of the many difficulties facing the international team was identifying the children, since only a small number of families have come forward and expressed an interest in offering their DNA.

She said: ‘Even if you had all of the families available, where the remains are, the fact that they are in sewage facilities, what kind of state they are they in, all of those kinds of things the experts will look at with the use of DNA and whether it is possible to identify them.

‘I would hope more families would come to us.’

Tuam home survivor Peter Mulryan, who has taken a case against Tusla in the High Court in the hope of finding his sister who is believed to have died in the home, said he felt this latest news was positive.

‘We have to move forward’ he said.

‘I think the minister is sincere, she is doing what we asked her to do she has carried it out to the best of her ability.’