"What we can do is just waiting. My sister-in-law has been waiting here for the last three days," said a young man who lost his elder brother Major Aziz in Wednesday's bloody mutiny in Bangladesh's capital Dhaka.
Thousands of paramilitary members of Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) staged a bloody revolt against their commanding officers deputed from the army during a meeting at BDR headquarters in west of Dhaka on Wednesday morning.
Local reports said more than 160 army officers as well as their family members were either killed or held as hostages.
Till Sunday evening, at least 64 army officers have been confirmed dead while 71 are still missing, the Bangladesh Army said.
"My brother was inside the meeting hall. He called me saying that the soldiers attacked... Already five days, it's almost certain he died. We are waiting for his body," the man, who was inquiring for information about his brother outside the BDR headquarters compound on Sunday, told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
He expressed deep shock and worried that even the body was found, it will be difficult to identify the decomposed body, as several decomposed bodies recovered on Saturday are not yet identified.
"My brother's 12-year-old son has just got admission to a cadet college," he said, adding that his daughter-in-law along with her son and four-year-old daughter went out of Dhaka to celebrate the admission just a few days before the mutiny occurred.
Like the young man, scores of family members of the missing army officers are waiting desperately each day, while only one body was recovered on Sunday.
Thirty to 40 relatives of missing victims came to inquire about the rescue development on Sunday alone, said a female army official who was working at an information center set up outside the BDR headquarters compound.
"We began to receive relatives of victims since Friday. In the morning time, there were a huge number of people. We are trying to help all of them," she said, adding that the information is open from 6:00 a.m. to 11 p.m. local time every day.
Around 2,000-member joint force of army, police, elite-force Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) and firefighters on Sunday continued searching for more bodies inside and near the BDR headquarters.
Bangladesh observed a three-day national mourning for the mutiny victims from Friday to Sunday with the national flag flying at half-mast. The government also decided all the army officers will be buried with state honor.
Officials said, each family of army officers who were killed will get one million taka (about 14,285 U.S. dollars) from the government and 500,000 taka (7,142 U.S. dollars) from the army.
The bloody mutiny which lasted for more than 30 hours has drawn widespread condemnation from both domestic and international communities.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon Saturday expressed his distress at the mounting death toll and condemned such brutal acts of violence.
"They (the mutineers) played a brutal game. They should be detected and punished," said Abul Kalam who lost his son-in-law whose body has been recovered from a mass grave inside BDR headquarters.
"My son-in-law was killed and my daughter was held as hostage for two days. Their baby is only three months old," Kalam said.
The Bangladeshi government has formed a high-powered committee to investigate the mutiny while a special tribunal for quick trial of the rebellious BDR members will also be formed soon to provide them exemplary punishment.
(Xinhua News Agency March 2, 2009)