Asylum and Migration
Unidentified Bodies Exhumed on Texel in Search for Missing Fishers
Police on Texel are exhuming 38 unidentified bodies to identify victims of North Sea disasters. DNA samples from the first nine remains will be compared with missing persons' data, following pressure from Urk’s fishing community. Relatives of 31 fishermen lost between 1922 and 1997 hope for matches. The project faced delays due to grave rights and overlapping plots. Since 2010, mandatory DNA collection has helped identify three migrants. Authorities describe the forensic operation as intensive, requiring careful layer-by-layer excavation before reburial.
Ozetta summarises; the reporting is the newsroom's