The Nigerian government has protested what it called the hasty burial of the 26 Nigerian women who were found dead on the Mediterranean Sea by Italian authorities nine days ahead of the slated date.
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, told journalists in Abuja on Monday that the Italian Embassy had earlier indicated to the Director-General, National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) that the burial would take place in Salerno, Italy on November 26, 2017.
But the Italian authorities, she said, went ahead with the burial last Friday without informing the Nigerian government, adding that the NAPTIP director is currently in Italy to engage with the Italian authorities ahead of the scheduled burial date.
The SSA who addressed newsmen alongside a NAPTIP representative, Mr. Abdulrahim Shaibu, explained that a protest letter had been sent to the Italian envoy in Nigeria over the matter.
“Why were they (the bodies) hurriedly buried nine days before the date communicated to the DG, NAPTIP by the Italian Embassy without any information to Nigerian Government? Why the rush to bury the bodies without carrying out post-mortem to determine the causes of death?” she queried.
Dabiri-Erewa said that information indicated that only three of the girls were identified as Nigerians, noting that the identities of the other victims had yet to be ascertained before they were interred.
She noted that another issue of concern was that the victims’ families may have wanted them buried in their countries of origin.
Only two of the 26 women whose bodies were recovered November 3 by Spanish rescue ships were immediately identified: Marian Shaka, a Muslim, and Osato Osara, a Christian.
Autopsies showed all but one drowned. The other had internal bleeding from a ruptured liver as a result of blunt trauma before falling in the water. None bore signs of recent physical or sexual abuse, Italian prosecutors said in a statement Friday. Two of the women were pregnant.
