Where there is a suspicion of a serious crime, the House of Representatives’ State Affairs and Good Governance Committee has ordered the government to keep unidentified human bodies protected for 20 years.

During its meeting in Kathmandu on Thursday, the committee issued a directive. The meeting was also attended by Home Minister Ram Bahadur Thapa and Home Secretary Maheshwar Neupane.

Secretary Neupane said during the meeting that the government had already prepared a draft of the protocol for dealing with unidentified corpses, but that it was awaiting approval from the Ministry of Finance because it would incur some costs.

Meanwhile, the committee ordered the government to create a website that would publish information about unidentified bodies, as well as photographs of them. Similarly, the government has been instructed to use social media to disseminate information.

According to the ministry, there are 1,189 unidentified human bodies in the world.