In Greece they lie under white tombstones, in Italy simple wooden crosses, and in France small slabs of slate. Some graves are marked with local versions of Ola and Kari Nordmann, “NN” (for “nameless”) or simply “migrant boat number 4”. All of them are used as evidence of human rights violations by countries in the EU in the face of refugees from other continents. That is according to the EU’s human rights commissioner, Dunja Mijatović. On the small sign it says “migrant boat number 4, 25.09.2022”. Photo: DESIREE MARTIN / AFP British The Guardian reports on Friday about as many as 1,015 unmarked graves at the borders of EU countries. They have arrived at the number after extensive collaboration with researchers, forensics and several charities, including the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Big dark numbers The many researchers who have participated in the project think they have only found the tip of the iceberg. The Mediterranean and the coasts of Italy, Malta, Cyprus and Greece have become “a great graveyard”, The New Yorker wrote earlier this year. More than 2 million people have tried to cross the Mediterranean to Europe since 2014, largely from sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. In 2021, more than 2,100 people were reported missing after fleeing abroad. Here the baby clothes hang on a fence on the border with Belarus. Photo: Oksana Manchuk / AP According to the organization Missing migrants project, more than 29,000 people have disappeared in the same period. Those who die on the migration routes to Europe are rarely found and identified, writes The New Yorker further. Have the right to an investigation The European Parliament decided in 2021 that people who die on known migration routes must be identified. The decision also recognized that a database was needed to get an overview of the people it applies to, but there are no national pieces of legislation yet that can meet this requirement. – It is clear that there is discrimination, says Kathryne Bomberger, head of the International Commission on Missing Persons, to The New Yorker. Hundreds of life jackets were laid down in protest in Vauxhall, London in 2016 to illustrate the many refugees who had to embark on the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean. Photo: Tim Ireland / AP – Finding missing persons and investigating the disappearances is the responsibility of each individual state, regardless of whether the person concerned is a citizen or not. Regardless of their nationality, ethnic background or race. The ICRC says that they have received 16,500 inquiries since 2013, from people who have lost their relatives after they embarked on a migration route towards Europe. These applied to nationals from Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Guinea, DR Congo, Eritrea and Syria. Only 285 of these have managed to find that theirs is missing.
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More than 1,000 unmarked graves discovered at the border with the EU – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
