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Grave of assassinated Burkina Faso leader exhumed

Security forces, top, keep watch near the Dagnoen Cemetery, as the graves of thirteen people including Burkina Faso revolutionary leader Thomas Sankara, are exhumed on the outskirts of Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, Monday, May 25, 2015. Sankara, a widely admired figure across Africa, was killed along with 12 others under unclear circumstances in the 1987 coup that brought his former best friend Blaise Compaore to power. (AP Photo/Theo Renaut) Security forces, top, keep watch near the Dagnoen Cemetery, as the graves of thirteen people including Burkina Faso revolutionary leader Thomas Sankara, are exhumed on the outskirts of Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, Monday, May 25, 2015. Sankara, a widely admired figure across Africa, was killed along with 12 others under unclear circumstances in the 1987 coup that brought his former best friend Blaise Compaore to power. (AP Photo/Theo Renaut)

By Associated Press May 26, 2015 1 min read

OUAGADOUGOU, Burkina Faso (AP) – Authorities have exhumed human remains from the grave of an assassinated president of Burkina Faso, nearly three decades after he was killed.

A family lawyer confirmed Tuesday that they also found bits of fabric inside the purported grave of former leader Thomas Sankara.

Sankara, a Marxist revolutionary, was killed in 1987 during a coup staged by his once-best friend Blaise Compaore.

Compaore was forced from power late last year, and Sankara’s family later demanded that his remains be exhumed. The family and many others in Burkina Faso want to know how Sankara was killed and if in fact the remains in the grave are actually his.