Baraybar is a forensic anthropologist and the former head of the UNMIK Forensics and Missing Persons Office who has exhumed mass graves in Rwanda, Bosnia and Kosovo. 

On the other hand, Smith is a ballistic expert, said Bagares.

CHR chair Leila de Lima will reportedly join the foreign team.

“The foreign experts will determine if proper procedure was conducted in the identification or retrieval of the victims. Essentially, they’ll perform an independent forensics investigation of the massacre,” Bagares said in a phone interview on Sunday.

The foreign experts will spend enough time to gather evidences important in filing the criminal case.

The main suspect in the Ampatuan town massacre is Datu Unsay Mayor Andal Ampatuan, Jr., who is now detained at the National Bureau of Investigation office in Manila.

Ampatuan Jr allegedly headed some 100 gunmen in abducting and later murdering a six-vehicle convoy of a politician’s family and supporters who were to file a certificate of candidacy, journalists who were to cover the filing, and commuters who were at the wrong place at the wrong time in Ampatuan town. 

That politician is Buluan Vice Mayor Esmael “Toto” G. Mangudadatu, who officially vied for Maguindanao’s top post last week accompanied by administration presidential bet Gilberto C. Teodoro, Jr.  

Mangudadatu had accused Ampatuan Jr of masterminding the carnage.

Ampatuan Jr. is the son of Maguindanao Gov.  DatuAndal Ampatuan, Sr and younger brother of Datu Zaldy U. Ampatuan, governor of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao 

The trio is among  nine members of the Ampatuan clan whom the Department of Justice considers as suspects in the Ampatuan town massacre. 

Ampatuan Jr. earlier denied involvement in the massacre, blaming it on the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. (MindaNews)

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