HARGEISA (Arabsiyoweb) -----Authorities in Somaliland have reburied dozens of skeletons of victims buried 30 years ago that were uncovered from a mass grave on the outskirts of the capital Hargeisa on Monday.

Thousands of residents have attended the mass reburial of the victims who were slain in the late 1980s by the regime of Siad Barre as the skeletons stuffed in cardboard boxes were buried in a burial ground.

Water well diggers who were undertaking water conservation campaign have discovered the skeletons that were crammed in a burial ground, prompting authorities to make proper burials in accordance with the Islamic law which instructs lonesome burials for each dead body.

“These victims were refugees fleeing mortar shelling when they were massacred with machine guns mounted on cars and anti aircraft missiles,” said Khadar Ahmed, the chairman of Somaliland War Crimes Investigation Commission.

The commission which was created in 1997 has in the past stone marked numerous mass grave sites that might be subject to exhumation.

“These 42 bodies we have here today were killed with prejudice – it’s a symbolic representation for what happened in our country.” said Hussein Ahmed Aideed, Somaliland’s justice minister.

Somaliland, a breakaway region in northern Somalia has declared a unilateral independence from the rest of Somalia in 1991; an era the horn of Africa nation’s central government was overthrown by warlords,  however, no country has so far recognized it as an independent state.