Searches continue for the ‘Disappeared’
Searches are continuing in counties Monaghan, Meath and Louth to try to recover the bodies of more of the so-called ‘Disappeared’.
The searches follow the discovery of human remains in a bog in Co Monaghan yesterday.
The remains will be removed today and brought to Dublin for examination.
It is believed they are those of 54-year-old Charlie Armstrong who vanished in August 1981 and is believed to have been murdered by the Provisional IRA.
Mr Armstrong, a father-of-five, disappeared while on his way to mass in Crossmaglen 29 years ago.
No reason has ever been given as to why he was murdered.
The area is still sealed-off as gardaí are treating it as a murder scene.
It is hoped the relatively good condition of the remains will ease the process of identification.
Search operation
Mr Armstrong is one of 14 men and women abducted and killed by republican paramilitaries mainly the IRA during the Troubles. Five bodies have so far been recovered.
The IRA admitted in 1999 that it killed and buried nine of the disappeared – Seamus Wright, Kevin McKee, Jean McConville, Columba McVeigh, Brendan Megraw, John McClory, Brian McKinney, Eamon Molloy and Danny McElhone – in secret locations.
The bodies of Mr Molloy, Mr McKinney, Mr McClory, Ms McConville and Mr McElhone have been found.
Others who vanished during the Troubles include Gerry Evans, Robert Nairac and Seamus Ruddy, who disappeared in France and whose murder was admitted by the INLA.
The ICLVR was set up by the British and Irish Governments in 1999 and reports to the Northern Ireland Office in Belfast and the Irish Justice Department in Dublin.
In 2007, it brought in Geoff Knupfer, the investigative scientist who helped find the bodies of the victims of Moors Murderers Ian Brady and Myra Hindley, to spearhead a new scientific approach to the searches.
This included bringing in an archaeological ‘time-team’, made up of geophysicists who used ground radar, scanners, probes and cadaver dogs which detect human remains.
