{"id":6064,"date":"2009-08-20T14:09:00","date_gmt":"2009-08-20T03:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fffaif.wordpress.com\/?p=6064"},"modified":"2009-08-20T14:09:00","modified_gmt":"2009-08-20T03:09:00","slug":"fromelles-status","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/?p=6064","title":{"rendered":"Fromelles status"},"content":{"rendered":"

Following the Fromelles Project being the subject of a number of press articles as reported in RECENT NEWS items Fromelles in news<\/strong><\/a><\/em> and Archaeological\u00a0Debate<\/a><\/em><\/strong>, the Minister for Defence Personnel, Materiel and Science, The Hon. Greg Combet AM MP\u00a0<\/span>made a detailed Ministerial Statement to the Australian Parliament’s House of Representatives on Wednesday 19 August.\u00a0 The statement covered the governance arrangements of the project, the progress with excavation, the approach to water management issues and details of the DNA testing processes, in particular that it includes testing of load bearing\u00a0 bones as well as other bones such as hands and teeth. The Minister also outlined the arrangements for reinterment and commemoration as well as costs. The Minister also advised that today was an open day for the media at the Fromelles site. His statement was followed by a response by the Shadow Minister for Veteran’s Affairs, Mrs Louise Markus MP. Their full statements are recorded in the draft\u00a0Hansard transcript for 19 August<\/em><\/strong><\/a> pages 66 to 71 and provide considerable detail of the background to the Fromelles Project as well as its current status.\u00a0 Both speakers acknowledged the contribution of Lambis Englezos AM in the identification of the Pheasant Wood site as likely to contain the remains of Australian and British soldiers and also recognised the contributions of others in this process.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"excavation<\/a><\/p>\n

Several media reports draw on the Ministerial statement. Click on the following links:<\/p>\n

Combet defends Fromelles exhumations<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: Max Blenkin, The Sydney Morning Herald<\/em>, 19 August<\/p>\n

Fromelles remains ‘mostly Diggers’<\/a><\/em><\/strong>: Patrick Walters, The Australian<\/em>, 20 August<\/p>\n

\"DNA<\/p>\n

Some of these reports refer to comments attributed to Johan Vandewalle.\u00a0 Johan is well known to many FFFAIF members and visitors to the Western Front battlefields, particularly for his hospitality at his ANZAC Rest<\/a><\/em><\/strong> cafe at Polygon Wood.\u00a0Johan was a key person in the recovery of the 5 Australian soldiers at\u00a0Zonnebecke and the subsequent identification of 3 of them with the aid of DNA analysis.\u00a0Johan is a civil engineer by profession who has developed his expertise in tunnelling and is\u00a0a co-author of the authoritative book B<\/em>eneath Flanders Fields: The Tunnellers’ War 1914-1918<\/em>\u00a0along with British Historian Peter Barton and Professor Peter Doyle, Visiting Professor in Geosciences at University College London.\u00a0His co-authors are also the co-secretaties to the British All-party Parliamentary War Graves and Battlefields Heritage Group<\/em><\/strong>.<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Johan<\/p>\n

Photo: Johan Vandewalle \u00a0and Lambis Engelzos<\/p>\n

Other media reports relating to Fromelles include:<\/p>\n

WWI dig finds remains of Australian soldiers<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: AFP, 9News<\/em>, 20 August<\/p>\n

Graves tell story of the forgotten battle of Fromelles<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: Sam Jones, The Guardian, 20 August\u00a0<\/p>\n

France: New Light on 1916 Battle<\/a><\/em><\/strong>: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE,\u00a020 August\u00a0<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

TheFamilies and Friends of the First AIF<\/em><\/strong>applauds\u00a0the joint Australian\u2013UK decision, announced by The Hon Greg Combet AM MP and the Hon Kevan Jones MP, to conduct a full DNA testing program on the remains of Australian and British soldiers found in mass graves at Pheasant Wood (Fromelles), and for their continuing commitment to identify as many of the fallen as is possible. We also thank the Australian, UK and French governments for affording dignified individual reburials for these soldiers, buried by\u00a0German soldiers following the Battle of Fromelles\u00a0on 19\/20 July 1916, in the new Fromelles (Pheasant Wood) Military Cemetery presently under construction at Fromelles.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Following the Fromelles Project being the subject of a number of press articles as reported in RECENT NEWS items Fromelles in news and Archaeological\u00a0Debate, the Minister for Defence Personnel, Materiel and Science, The Hon. Greg Combet AM MP\u00a0made a detailed … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[74],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-top-posts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6064\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fffaif.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}