SRINAGAR, JANUARY 6: A Fresh forensic examination of a body exhumed around two years ago from a south Kashmir village has revealed it to be that of Paul Wells, a British national who has been missing, along with four other Western tourists, for the past four-and-a-half years.Sources in Jammu and Kashmir Police and State Home Department confirmed the report. ``The tests on the remains had shown a DNA match with that of his parents,'' a senior police officer said, while quoting the forensic test report. He said the DNA of the exhumed body was matched with that of blood samples taken from Wells' parents.The British High Commission in New Delhi also confirmed that they ``had heard about this new forensic report revealing the exhumed body is that of Paul Wells''. The press officer of the High Commission, Judith Slater, told the The Indian Express that they are keen to see this new report. ``Our forensic experts had checked the dental records of Wells which were not matching with that of the teeth of this exhumed body,'' she said. ``In fact, we had also been given samples from the body soon after it was exhumed, but they had not been sufficient for DNA test.''A group of four Western tourists, Derk Hassert (German), Keith Mangan, John Childs and Paul Wells (Britons) were kidnapped on July 4, 1995 by an unknown militant outfit going by the name of Al-Faran, while trekking ahead of Pahalgam in south Kashmir. Four days later, one among the tourists, John Childs, escaped from the captivity of the abductors, who later kidnapped two more tourists, German Derk Hessert and Norwegian Hans Christian Ostro.The shadowy Al-Faran had later demanded release of over two dozen militants, especially foreigners, from various Indian jails in exchange of these hostages, which was not accepted by the Government. On August 13, 1995, the beheaded body of one of the hostages, Hans Christian Ostro, a Norwegian, was later recovered from nearby Ashmuqam village, while mystery shrouds the fate of the other tourists even over four-and-a-half years after their abduction. However, two militants allegedly involved with the abduction who were captured in the Valley claimed that all the hostages had been buried after being shot dead.Later a body, suspected to be that of Paul Wells, was exhumed from village Akingam in Anantnag district on September 25, 1997, by the crime branch of the Jammu and Kashmir Police for forensic examination. The tests that were subsequently conducted by a forensic laboratory in Hyderabad negated that the body was that of the British tourist. However, a fresh DNA test conducted by another forensic laboratory in Calcutta confirmed that the exhumed body is actually that of the kidnapped tourist.The Government has been claiming that Al-Faran was a frontal outfit of the pan-Islamic Harkat-ul-Ansar (HUA) militant outfit. HUA, that was later declared a foreign terrorist outfit by the United States, has changed its name again and is active in J&K as Harkat-ul-Mujahideen. Interestingly, the list of militants demanded to be released by Al-Faran in exchange of these tourists also included the Harkat ideologue, Maulana Masood Azhar, who was recently released along with two others in exchange of the passengers and crew of the hijacked Indian Airlines plane.Wells' mother skeptical about DNA resultsLONDON: The parent of British national Paul Wells said on Thursday she was skeptical about new DNA test results which confirmed her son's death. Diane Wells said she feared her son was dead, but she would wait for confirmation from British officials before accepting that the exhumed body belonged to him. "What we have been told today contradicts what we have been told before about the DNA tests," she said. "I'm just feeling completely confused about it. I still don't know what to think."
