39 202. The report indicates that it was very difficult to identify the children, because of the state of conservation and decomposition in which they were retrieved and also because children generally do not have any distinguishing dental or skeletal features that allow differentiation. While age and sex are two of the most important characteristics of identification for children, there were further problems 238 because the ages supplied were not always exact . IV. LEGAL ANALYSIS A. The prior question of victim identification 203. As is clear from the “Evidence” section, the violent acts left a human toll of such extent that it has been difficult to define it completely. The Commission observes, more specifically, that in this case there are a number of complex circumstances that make it very difficult to identify the victims, both those who died and their surviving relatives. 204. Then there is the mass scale of the killings, which occurred in rural areas of difficult access using means that impeded the complete identification of the victims. As indicated in the previous section, several of the massacres were accompanied by burning of the places where the bodies were left, 239 a situation cited by the EAAF as one of the main difficulties in identifying the murdered victims . As well, because the surviving relatives were able to return to the area only several days or even weeks later, when they arrived they found many bodies dismembered. In some cases, this is reflected in the reports of international experts who mention that on several occasions they found bone concentrations or “body 240 parts”, but could not locate complete skeletons . 205. Another element highlighted by the EAAF and other international experts involved in the case is the number of children who lost their lives in the massacres. According to those experts, this in itself poses a serious difficulty in terms of satisfactory identification, for in many cases the children’s bodies were burned, and at their young age their bones were still in the process of formation and were 241 particularly fragile. 206. Nor are there any records or certificates containing a list of persons who lived in the cantons and villages affected. One of the EAAF exhumation reports indicates that the town hall of the municipality of Meanguera, in the jurisdiction of which the events occurred, was burned during the armed 242 conflict. 207. On this point, the context in which the events occurred meant that the persons who died, and their surviving relatives, had not been living in those places for very long, as displacements from one location to another were common in the atmosphere of terror created by operations similar to those 238 Ibid. 239 Report of the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team on the exhumations conducted in 1992 (Annex D to the petitioners’ communication of November 11, 2002). That document indicates that the bone remains were in a very poor state of conservation, and many were incomplete. This reflects various factors, including the high number of children, the quantity of bullet fragments that impacted the bodies and clothing of the victims, the effect of fire, the collapse of the roof and walls of the building onto the bodies, and the degree of soil acidity 240 For example, from the exhumations at Site 2 in El Mozote in 2001, the EAAF concluded that the skeletal remains were in very poor condition, and only fragments of bones and ashes could be retrieved. It was not possible to find articulated or semiarticulated skeletons. At least 31 concentrations of skull bone fragments were found, but this was not necessarily the number of individuals. 95 pieces of ballistic evidence were retrieved. Among the factors responsible for deterioration of the bone remains were the action of fire, the quantity of projectiles found that produced serious lesions in the bones, and the collapse of the roof and walls of the building onto the bodies. 241 Report of the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team on the exhumations conducted in 1992 (Annex D to the petitioners’ communication of November 11, 2002) and Report of the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team on the exhumations conducted in 2000 (Annex E to the petitioners’ communication of November 11, 2002). 242 Report of the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team on the exhumations conducted in 2000 (Annex E to the petitioners’ communication of November 11, 2002).