Winter means more deaths for refugees

"All the morgues are full. Locals who find the bodies inform the prosecutors, and the corpses come to us for examination. We've been busily receiving the bodies since March. The traffic increased in April and May. We expect more bodies to be found as the snow melts."

This is how an official in the eastern province of Van described the situation in the area last May. In 2019, the number of bodies belonging to refugees that were found in Van doubled compared to the previous year, with the remains of more than 50 arriving at the forensic morgue in the first five months of 2019.

But Van's bitter winter cold wasn't the only cause of death: In July 2019, 17 refugees died when their minivan had a car accident. Their driver was their smuggler.

In December, a boat trying to cross Lake Van had an accident, killing seven - although 64 were saved. And the pace of the tragedies hasn't let up in the first two months of 2020 either: At the beginning of February, 49 refugees called the police for rescue from the freezing cold.

The rescue operation lasted for five hours. Locals reported that 13 refugees might have lost their lives on Feb. 9. Officials in Van announced that the search would begin if weather conditions permitted. Most probably, locals will come across the remains themselves when the snow finally melts.

'Winter means more deaths'

These are among just a few of the incidents occurring in Van. After the Aegean Sea, this border city by Iran is becoming a mass grave for refugees. Mahmut Kaçan, a member of the Van Bar Association's Commission for Refugees, said there were no official records kept of the number of refugees who lose their lives on the border.

"There have always been particular incidents in Van...

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