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 a substitute, he is been known as out day and evening to take care of lifeless African migrants, as they arrive by sea in rising numbers.
“I thought El Hierro would be quieter, with two or three deaths a year,” stated Martinez, who got here from close by Tenerife, as he drove his Humvee automotive on a windy October Sunday to a funeral house to post-mortem one other physique.
Thus far this 12 months, 33 irregular migrants have arrived lifeless 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 working at all-time highs. However the fee of migrants going lacking or dying on the voyage is rising 5 instances quicker, the newest 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 general irregular arrivals to Europe have declined.
As some European international locations crack down laborious 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 looking for information of them.
The physique that Martinez was about to look at was male, African, aged between 30 and 35. Like 1000’s 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 brought on by many hours in chilly, moist circumstances with out shelter.
Thus far this 12 months round 20,000 irregular migrants have arrived on El Hierro, based on the Crimson Cross. That is about half the entire 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 lifeless 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 the planet and since solely partial information is accessible, 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 lifeless our bodies are thrown overboard.
Spain has no official database of lifeless migrants: It solely counts these arriving alive, stated an inside ministry spokesperson.
“The causes of death are almost always the same: dehydration, hypothermia and drinking seawater,” stated Martinez.
Migrants barely eat or drink potable water within the roughly six-day crossing, Martinez stated – 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, stated he was a relative, and that the lifeless man got here from Senegal and his identify was Bathie Barry.
Confirming the identities of the lifeless can take months. Most migrants throw their ID playing cards overboard earlier than reaching shore for concern of deportation, stated a Spanish safety supply. The logic is that if they’re unidentified, it will likely 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 knowledge right into a database of lacking folks to match in opposition to information of these already reported.
That course of can take as much as two months, Martinez stated.
In his expertise, he added, no match is present in over 90% of migrant deaths: It is too sophisticated to hint kinfolk or have them securely present DNA samples from Africa.
Two of the three forensic law enforcement officials primarily based in El Hierro took fingerprints and footage of the physique to add right into a regulation enforcement database.
VANISHED IN THE OCEAN
The surge in migration to the Canaries is one in every of a number of elements behind the rising deaths and disappearances, stated Andrea Garcia Borja, appearing coordinator of the IOM’s Lacking Migrants Challenge. It tallies estimates of deaths and disappearances by way of 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 stated. Smuggling networks have exploited instability within the Sahel area, the place an Islamist rebellion is raging, and are dispatching extra boats than prior to now, based on the European Union border company Frontex.
In September, solely 27 migrants have been discovered alive after a ship stated by Spain’s coast guard to hold 84 folks capsized. It was the Canaries’ worst shipwreck on file; an area choose is investigating the accident.
9 folks have been buried in El Hierro. The rest are believed to have sunk into the ocean.
Martinez stated he acquired a name at 3am to take care of the lifeless.
On the time, El Hierro solely had two cadaver fridges — every with house for one physique — so Martinez positioned the seven different corpses in a room usually used for wakes, which may be cooled near zero levels Celsius.
Martinez, whose grandfather embalmed the physique of Spain’s former dictator Francisco Franco in 1975, stated 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 stated, makes it simpler to take care of a scientific distance.
“The emotional attachment that accompanies death is missing,” he stated.
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 after 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,” stated Borja, the IOM’s Lacking Migrants official.
The IOM stated in a 2021 report that Spain lacked particular procedures associated to the search, investigation and identification of lacking or lifeless migrants. It known as for the creation of a centralised mechanism.
An IOM Spain spokesperson stated 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 – stated 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, stated the maritime authority doesn’t examine migrant boat accidents to find out potential administrative failures, as a result of the boats aren’t licensed and lack possession info.
Abroad diplomatic places of work 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 after they had.
The Spanish inside ministry spokesperson stated Spain’s justice system and Civil Guard police examine instances 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 instances, the Crimson Cross informally identifies lifeless migrants by means of proof or interviews with associates or households, stated 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 just about 1,000 within the burial partitions.
None of those that travelled with Barry might attend the ceremony. They have 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 means of its international community, Cruz stated.
It was a fast, silent interment attended by six folks: 4 officers and two volunteer mourners who purchased flowers. Certainly one of them positioned pink, pink and purple blooms on the grave.
Some have been inside a bit of paper mannequin boat.
“Wherever their families are, we want them to know that we are here to accompany them and pay a small tribute,” stated 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 working out of house.
