Reckoning with past atrocities and creating a lasting peace encompasses many aspects, some more difficult than others in terms of action. For the third workshop, UMAM D&R and the International Center for Transitional Justice brought together a mixed group of presenters and attendees to explore one of these transitional mechanisms: mass graves.

To lead the workshop, Luis Fondebrider, co-founder and president of the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team, was invited to talk about his extensive experience exhuming graves and dealing with forensics at burial sites around the world.

The workshop focused on the application of forensic sciences to the investigation of political violence, drawing upon case studies in Latin America while also looking at what type of work has been carried out in Lebanon. Moreover, the workshop focused on some of the practical aspects of mass burials and the value of such methods for record keeping and how to handle the remains of corpses and skeletons. Although uncovering mass graves receives comparatively less attention than other aspects of post-war transition in Lebanon, it is an equally important topic.