A woman whose body was discovered in Spain more than 20 years ago has been identified through an international police campaign.
The woman was named on Thursday as 31-year-old Russian citizen Liudmila Zavada.
She is the third person to be identified through the Operation Identify Me initiative, launched by police in 2023 to find the names of women who had been murdered or died in suspicious circumstances in Europe.
The first case identified was a British woman murdered in Belgium, whose family identified her after seeing a tattoo in a BBC News report.
Valdecy Urquiza, secretary general of Interpol, stated that this identification brings new hope and leads to families searching for missing persons. After 20 years, an unknown woman has been given back her name, he remarked.
Ms. Zavada’s body was found in July 2005 beside a road in the province of Barcelona, leading local police to label her as the woman in pink, due to her clothing. Though the cause of death was deemed suspicious, her identity remained a mystery until recently.
The case was included in Operation Identify Me last year, with efforts including the release of Interpol black notices to the public and sharing forensic records globally. Earlier this year, Turkish police matched her fingerprints to a national database, uncovering her identity, followed by a DNA match with a relative in Russia.
Investigations into the circumstances of Ms. Zavada's death are ongoing, as Interpol continues to seek identities of 44 more women found dead across several European nations.
