Jerusalem memorial ceremony for four UN observers killed in Israeli bombing

According to FDF, death of Finnish officer is certain

Jarno Tapio Mäkinen

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A memorial ceremony was held in Jerusalem on Sunday for the four United Nations UNTSO observers killed last Tuesday by an Israeli air strike on their post in Southern Lebanon. Around seventy people were in attendance, some of them relatives of the dead men, and others UN officials.
      All of the Finnish UNTSO observers stationed in Israel were present at the ceremony in the garden courtyard of the UN Truce Supervision Organization.
      Among the four dead was a Finnish Navy Lieutenant 1st Class , 29-year-old Jarno Tapio Mäkinen. A minute's silence was held in memory of the fallen soldiers. Capt. Jarno Limnell gave a short address at the occasion about his dead colleague and friend.
     
According to the statement issued by the Finnish Defence Forces, Limnell said that Finnish observers would continue to carry out their tasks in the Middle East despite the grief felt at the loss of their comrades.
      Mäkinen's relatives were not present in Jerusalem.
      In the view of the FDF, the Finnish victim is quite definitely among the dead, even though it has not been possible as yet to identify the body. Three bodies have thus far been brought out of the rubble of the former observation post - two have been idenitifed as observers from China and Canada. A further UN observer from Austria also remains unidentified.
     
The four men all died when Israel launched an air strike on their observation post in Khiam, following several hours of artillery shelling in the immediate area.
      The observers had repeatedly requested that Israel call off the bombardment in the area.


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