{"id":73929,"date":"2026-08-21T18:56:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T18:56:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/73929\/"},"modified":"2026-08-21T18:56:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T18:56:15","slug":"first-migrants-buried-in-spains-ceuta-after-deadly-border-rush-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/73929\/","title":{"rendered":"First Migrants Buried in Spain’s Ceuta After Deadly Border Rush"},"content":{"rendered":"

CEUTA, Spain, Aug 21 (Reuters) – In front of a \u2060dozen \u2060reporters and a handful of \u2060local people, a crew of gravediggers in disposable protective overalls \u200band facemasks on Friday started burying some of the scores of migrants who died in a \u200cmass crossing into the Spanish \u200cenclave of Ceuta in North Africa three weeks ago.<\/p>\n

A Muslim cleric read a quick \u2060prayer as \u2060the workers lowered the first four victims wrapped in white body \u200bbags into cinderblock-lined graves side-by-side at Ceuta’s Muslim cemetery, while hearses were bringing more bodies.<\/p>\n

The cemetery’s acting manager, Said Mohammed, said the plan was to bury around 70 bodies in the coming \u200bdays, with 10 to 12 burials each day.<\/p>\n

About 95% of those being buried have \u2060not \u2060yet been identified, but each \u2060grave was \u200bmarked with a numbered stone in case the body was claimed and repatriated eventually, \u200bhe said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Authorities say between \u20605,000 and 8,000 people remain in Ceuta after at least 72,000 people crossed from Morocco on July 30 in a rush that left 82 migrants dead on the Spanish side of the border, with 14 more deaths confirmed by Morocco.<\/p>\n

The migrants were buried with \u2060Muslim rites, which require the body to be placed facing Mecca and covered with \u2060soil, Mohammed said.<\/p>\n

Authorities have only been able to identify six migrants, all Moroccan adult males, according to the latest data provided by Ceuta’s court. Desperate Moroccan relatives of missing migrants have been pleading for information on social media and pressing officials at the border.<\/p>\n

The migrants’ fingerprint data was run through Spanish and Moroccan databases and their DNA samples compared with relatives who came forward, said Guardia Civil Lieutenant Colonel Carlos Atoche, who heads the police’s crime division \u2060and led a team of nine officers sent to Ceuta.<\/p>\n

He said a major reason for the low number of identifications has been the difficulty for Moroccan relatives to legally cross into Ceuta to leave DNA samples at an office \u200bset up by Spanish authorities near the border.<\/p>\n

(Reporting by Michael Gore \u200band Joan Faus, editing by Andrei Khalip)<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 Thomson Reuters.<\/p>\n

Photos You Should See: August 2026<\/p>\n

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