When heavy rains in 1997 exposed bones, ropes, broken skulls and torn pieces of clothing in shallow graves in Hargeysa, capital of the self-declared state of Somaliland, northwestern Somalia, it set in motion the rudimentary beginnings of an international investigation into alleged war crimes. > read more
	Somalilanders say these mass graves contain loved ones who were executed during Muhammed Siyad Barre's notorious military regime - when war against the north caused an estimated 250,000 people to flee in 1988 into neighbouring Ethiopia and Djibouti. > read more
	"My husband, Yasin Ahmad Bisat, was a driver, and we had a vehicle he used to rent out. He was taken one evening in 1984. Soldiers were sent to the house, but he had actually already been picked up on the street... some boys came to me and told me he had been taken." > read more
	Forensic experts describe finding human remains with "knotted loops of rope binding their wrists together behind their backs" > read more
	As the south was consumed by factional fighting, the northern based SNM declared unilateral independence for Somaliland in May 1991, based on the former British Somaliland borders. > read more More than 12 internationally hosted and sponsored reconciliation conferences for Somalis failed in the decade following the collapse of the Barre regime. But in August 2000, Djibouti-hosted Somali talks - based initially on clan representation and civil society groups, and including former politicians, faction leaders and military officers - resulted in the election of the Transitional National Government (TNG) and President Abdiqassim Salad Hassan. > read more
	Some of the alleged mass graves sites seen by IRIN are near schools, where children play among pieces of bones and military uniforms - some have fallen into holes and shallow burial mounds. > read more
	Somaliland President Muhammad Ibrahim Egal claims: "The international community has been somewhat reluctant to follow it up. It appears the discovery of the graves was somewhat embarrassing to the international community. I never understood why..." > read more
	Read more eyewitness reports, analysis and interviews here