By Joan Faus
VALVERDE, Spain (Reuters) – Two years in the past forensic pathologist Modesto Martinez, 68, moved to the tiny Canary Island of El Hierro with an eye fixed to retiring. As an alternative, he is been known as out day and night time to take care of useless African migrants, as they arrive by sea in rising numbers.
“I thought El Hierro would be quieter, with two or three deaths a year,” mentioned Martinez, who got here from close by Tenerife, as he drove his Humvee automobile on a windy October Sunday to a funeral dwelling to post-mortem one other physique.
Thus far this yr, 33 irregular migrants have arrived useless or died shortly after reaching El Hierro, based on official information. In 2023, the quantity was 11. In 2022, there was one.
The variety of migrants arriving from the West African coast within the Spanish archipelago is operating at all-time highs. However the price of migrants going lacking or dying on the voyage is rising 5 instances quicker, the most recent accessible information exhibits.
Martinez is the one forensic pathologist on El Hierro, which has a inhabitants of 11,400 and is a rising vacation spot for migrants at a time when total irregular arrivals to Europe have declined.
As some European international locations crack down arduous on migration, the pathologist’s predicament underscores the heightened dangers being taken by these impelled to attempt to make a brand new life for themselves, in addition to the darkish months endured by their households in search of information of them.
The physique that Martinez was about to look at was male, African, aged between 30 and 35. Like hundreds of others, he had made a treacherous Atlantic crossing of roughly 2,000 km (1,242 miles) from West Africa, crammed into an open-topped boat.
He died the day earlier than, apparently of hypothermia attributable to many hours in chilly, moist circumstances with out shelter.
Thus far this yr round 20,000 irregular migrants have arrived on El Hierro, based on the Crimson Cross. That is about half the full of greater than 40,000 who reached the Canary Islands archipelago over the interval — itself a brand new file.
Migrant arrivals to the Canaries rose 12% between January and October, based on Spain’s inside ministry. However the variety of useless or disappeared was up 61% in the identical interval to 891, based on estimates by the Worldwide Group for Migration (IOM).
It says the route is the second-deadliest on this planet and since solely partial information is on the market, its estimates are conservative. The Crimson Cross believes nearly all of deceased migrants by no means even attain the Canaries, however both drown or their useless our bodies are thrown overboard.
Spain has no official database of useless migrants: It solely counts these arriving alive, mentioned an inside ministry spokesperson.
“The causes of death are almost always the same: dehydration, hypothermia and drinking seawater,” mentioned Martinez.
Migrants barely eat or drink potable water within the roughly six-day crossing, Martinez mentioned – when he opens a corpse he does not discover any meals stays, and any hint of water “smells like seawater.”
“BATHIE BARRY”
On this case, El Hierro’s authorities had a lead on the person’s identification. One other migrant who arrived on the identical boat had come ahead, mentioned he was a relative, and that the useless man got here from Senegal and his identify was Bathie Barry.
Confirming the identities of the useless can take months. Most migrants throw their ID playing cards overboard earlier than reaching shore for concern of deportation, mentioned a Spanish safety supply. The logic is that if they’re unidentified, will probably be tougher for authorities to show their nation of origin and ship them again.
Martinez famous within the post-mortem report that the deceased had a number of enamel damaged and lacking.
The pathologist took a blood pattern. This he would use to ship DNA to a lab in Tenerife, which might add the data right into a database of lacking folks to check towards data of these already reported.
That course of can take as much as two months, Martinez mentioned.
In his expertise, he added, no match is present in over 90% of migrant deaths: It is too sophisticated to hint relations or have them securely present DNA samples from Africa.
Two of the three forensic law enforcement officials based mostly in El Hierro took fingerprints and footage of the physique to add right into a legislation enforcement database.
VANISHED IN THE OCEAN
The surge in migration to the Canaries is certainly one of a number of elements behind the rising deaths and disappearances, mentioned Andrea Garcia Borja, performing coordinator of the IOM’s Lacking Migrants Venture. It tallies estimates of deaths and disappearances through information articles, official sources and unbiased investigations.
Boats have been coming from additional away in West Africa, with smugglers packing in as much as 300 folks on every craft, she mentioned. Smuggling networks have exploited instability within the Sahel area, the place an Islamist rebellion is raging, and are dispatching extra boats than previously, based on the European Union border company Frontex.
In September, solely 27 migrants had been discovered alive after a ship mentioned by Spain’s coast guard to hold 84 folks capsized. It was the Canaries’ worst shipwreck on file; a neighborhood decide is investigating the accident.
9 folks had been buried in El Hierro. The rest are believed to have sunk into the ocean.
Martinez mentioned he acquired a name at 3am to take care of the useless.
On the time, El Hierro solely had two cadaver fridges — every with area for one physique — so Martinez positioned the seven different corpses in a room usually used for wakes, which could be cooled near zero levels Celsius.
Martinez, whose grandfather embalmed the physique of Spain’s former dictator Francisco Franco in 1975, mentioned he had by no means labored with migrants earlier than he got here to the island.
The absence of grieving households with their urgent questions, he mentioned, makes it simpler to keep up a medical distance.
“The emotional attachment that accompanies death is missing,” he mentioned.
The island has one post-mortem desk, in a room with out air-conditioning. Typical autumn noon temperatures attain round 20 levels Celsius (68 Fahrenheit), so pathologists often open a door onto the road, blocking the view with a hospital display.
INTO THE VOID
El Hierro is only one instance of the void into which migrants are launched once they board smugglers’ boats.
“To the best of my knowledge, there is no specific protocol for the search and identification of missing migrants in Spain, any European country or the United States,” mentioned Borja, the IOM’s Lacking Migrants official.
The IOM mentioned in a 2021 report that Spain lacked particular procedures associated to the search, investigation and identification of lacking or useless migrants. It known as for the creation of a centralised mechanism.
An IOM Spain spokesperson mentioned he was unaware whether or not Spain had utilized these suggestions. Spain’s justice ministry didn’t reply to questions on whether or not it had.
Following the September shipwreck, NGO Caminando Fronteras – which runs a hotline for migrant boats in misery – mentioned the Spanish authorities have utilized double requirements of their response to migrant deaths in contrast with different maritime casualties.
“Spain does not apply the same laws and protocols to someone that suffers a tragedy on a yacht or a fishing vessel to those that die on a migrant boat,” the NGO’s founder Helena Maleno advised Reuters.
A spokesperson for Spain’s transport ministry, which oversees maritime coverage, mentioned the maritime authority doesn’t examine migrant boat accidents to find out potential administrative failures, as a result of the boats will not be licensed and lack possession info.
Abroad diplomatic workplaces can cooperate in dealing with demise declarations following an air or maritime accident, however Spain’s overseas affairs and justice ministries didn’t reply to requests for touch upon once they had.
The Spanish inside ministry spokesperson mentioned Spain’s justice system and Civil Guard police examine circumstances of migrant deaths within the sea if there may be proof of corpses lacking, however declined to elaborate.
To attempt to fill the hole, in 2021 the Crimson Cross launched a programme to collect details about individuals who disappear or die whereas migrating to the Canaries.
In about 40% of circumstances, the Crimson Cross informally identifies useless migrants by proof or interviews with buddies or households, mentioned Silvia Cruz, who works within the programme.
“SMALL TRIBUTE”
The day after the post-mortem, the deceased migrant’s physique was interred throughout the island in a concrete grave in a wall of the El Pinar cemetery, on the foot of lava fields and surrounded by goats and shrubs.
It was marked along with his case file quantity, his date of demise and the phrases “Bathie Barry” and “Immigrant.” Migrants occupy greater than 30 primarily anonymous slots out of virtually 1,000 within the burial partitions.
None of those that travelled with Barry might attend the ceremony. They had been being held in police custody or in hospital.
The Crimson Cross contacted the shelter the place his relative was staying to supply assist passing phrase of his demise by its world community, Cruz mentioned.
It was a fast, silent interment attended by six folks: 4 officers and two volunteer mourners who purchased flowers. One in all them positioned crimson, pink and purple blooms on the grave.
Some had been inside slightly paper mannequin boat.
“Wherever their families are, we want them to know that we are here to accompany them and pay a small tribute,” mentioned the volunteer, Haridian Marichal, 38.
Final month, the regional authorities put in six new cadaver fridges within the port. The cemetery has requested an extension as it’s operating out of area.
