The excavations in the basement of the monastery

Student of Ukraine's Lviv medical institute Roman Narepekha, left, and serviceman Andriy Shtereb extract human bones supposedly belong to victims of Soviet secret police, discovered at a basement of a monastery in the town of Zhovkva, 570 km (340 miles) west of Ukraine's capital Kiev, on Thursday, July 18, 2002. The bodies of 190 people, including 70 children, some less than one year old, were found by monks doing maintenance works in the monastery that was used by the NKVD, the predecessor of KGB, after World War II. Investigation is still underway, however there is little hope of proving NKVD responsibility beyond doubt, since NKVD records of the time were moved to Moscow, where they are still classified, said Mikhail Pavlishin, a leader of a team of experts investigating the burial site. Photo UNIAN