Inserts:

00:03 Report / Rebecca Ritters
01:59 Viktor Serhiiovych / Odesa Regional Bureau of Forensic Medical Examination
02:21 Rebecca Ritters / DW Correspondent
02:57 Yuliia Pozdnyakova / Widow
04:03 Yuliia Pozdnyakova / Widow
05:30 Viktor Serhiiovych / Odesa Regional Bureau of Forensic Medical Examination

Script:

+++SYN MAZ+++

At this rail yard in Odesa, old trains have been remodelled — given new life… as carriers of the dead.

((under pics))
+++SOT Viktor Serhiiovych, Forensic medical expert, Odesa Regional Bureau of Forensic Medical Examination ((15 secs - Ukr))
They are brought here in trucks, unpacked into body bags, assigned registration numbers, and then either placed in railcars, or directly into tents [for examination].

Each carriage holds around 200 bodies. All of them Ukrainian soldiers - swapped with Russia for remains of their dead. 

They arrive without names, many without faces, and some just a jumble of parts.

But each body bag represents a person waiting to be identified.

+++SOT Viktor Serhiiovych, Forensic medical expert, Odesa Regional Bureau of Forensic Medical Examination ((15 secs Ukr))
[This work] is extremely difficult—difficult for everyone: for the orderlies who transport the bodies, for the experts who examine them, and for the doctors who perform DNA identification. 

They've been dead for months, some even for years.

Every detail matters. Even if a body is in advanced stages of decomposition, forensic experts can still find clues.

+++SOT Viktor Serhiiovych, Forensic medical expert, Odesa Regional Bureau of Forensic Medical Examination ((16 secs Ukr))
If teeth are present—it is possible to determine age… I believe this is a young person, a young man approximately 20–35 years old.
The team records any evidence they can find: injuries, clothes, jewellery, even tattoos. They analyse samples for DNA and submit their findings to a nationwide register. 
It can take months, even years, to produce a match.
Of the 3,000 bodies allocated to this region so far, the team has identified around 700.

+++SOT Viktor Serhiiovych, Forensic medical expert, Odesa Regional Bureau of Forensic Medical Examination ((12 secs Ukr))
When it is confirmed that the person has died, people find some inner peace. That is why identification is necessary.

Bodies of the newly identified are stored here - before being returned to their families. 

+++PTC Rebecca Ritters, DW Correspondent
These bodies account for only a tiny fraction of the more than 70,000 people — both civilians and soldiers — who have been registered “missing under special circumstances” since this war began. Still, all identifications offer some comfort to the families, many of whom have waited years for information of their loved ones.

Like Yuliia… who waited for more than a year.

Her husband, Volodymyr, was a police officer who signed up to fight, and then went missing in eastern Ukraine.

For months, she knew nothing. 

+++SOT Yuliia Pozdnyakova, Widow ((17 secs Ukr))
For me, this status - 'missing in action' - gives hope. Because during the war we’ve seen so many cases where people are buried by DNA, and then later the men come back [alive].

Yuliia searched databases, Telegram channels and morgues but couldn’t find him.

+++SOT Yuliia Pozdnyakova, Widow  ((5 secs Ukr))
I searched for more than a year. For more than a year I waited, hoped, believed.

She submitted DNA samples from their daughter but investigators said that wasn’t enough.

+++SOT Yuliia Pozdnyakova, Widow  ((8  secs Ukr))
Then one day I lay there thinking, “God, Volodymyr, give me a sign—what should I do? Where can I find it?”. And suddenly it came to me — his beret!

His favourite hat gave them the missing link. There was enough DNA in it for forensics to make a match. And investigators found Volodymyr's body among the thousands waiting in Odesa.

But DNA evidence can feel like an abstract fact - not always enough for the grieving.
Yulia was advised not to look at the forensic photos of his body – but she insisted.
+++SOT Yuliia Pozdnyakova, Widow ((17 secs, + 7 for emotion Ukr))
I said, yes, I must see them! Because otherwise I will search for him my whole life. They showed me the photos. I could see from the photos that it was Volodomyr. Even in that condition.

She no longer had to wait and wonder. 

+++SOT Yuliia Pozdnyakova, Widow  ((15 secs Ukr))
Strangely, it became a bit easier, because I knew it was him. I know he's not being tortured. He's not in the forest, he's not in a trench.

She cremated Volodymyr, as he had wished. And buried his ashes with some personal belongings — fragments of his life cut short by the war.

+++SOT Yuliia Pozdnyakova, Widow  ((20 secs Ukr))
I loved him endlessly. Maybe I should have fallen in the grave sobbing. But I can’t be theatrical about grief — I buried him with dignity.

Yuliia now has to rebuild her life around her grief and her daughter. 

But for thousands of others the waiting continues, and so does the work of identification.

+++SOT Viktor Serhiiovych, Forensic medical expert, Odesa Regional Bureau of Forensic Medical Examination ((7 secs Ukr))
War will end only when the last fallen soldier is identified.

Long after the last drone is silenced, and the last bomb has fallen. 

+++END+++