Verizon did it again? They were just named. Because most reliable network by route metrics- and this isn't the first time in fact they won. This are sixteen times in a row proven once again that nobody builds networks like Verizon builds networks. That's why they're builder five g right. That's why there's only one best network Verizon best and most I will based on route metrics reports from second have twenty thirteen. The first have twenty twenty one of three operators on all network types, combined, not specific to five g networks from New York Times. I'm like will borrow. This is a daily over the Last year, a record truth thousand migrants from Africa have drowned trying to reach Spain and the promise of a better life in Europe. My colleague Madrid Bureau Chiefs Nick

Casey tells the story of a man who has committed himself to returning their bodies home to their families, It's Wednesday November tenth. Nick tell me about this reporting that you ve been doing on migrants in Spain. Will I arrived to Spain at the beginning of this year and in February, and one of the first things that really caught my attention and in Spain the bodies of at least seventeen migrants have been taken to a port in Tenerife after they were found in the Atlantic Ocean? Was these headlines?

that you'd see in the newspapers. This improvised Alta remember twenty three young Moroccans who died trying to reach Spain in November about at the drownings of migrants. At sea there are concerns more migrants and refugees will attempt. The danger was crossing when mother and sea conditions improve the internets they're coming in boats that are much bigger than canoes, and these are rickety vessels going through areas with really strong currents. So many of the people who decide to make the journey don't make it the boats sink. Their bodies float in the ocean for a couple of days. Sometimes it's weeks, and then the bodies washed ashore and Nick. Where are these migrants coming from both the migrant sir, largely from nor

in West Africa with a lot of people coming from Morocco. These places have long been behind Europe. Economically, they ve gone through covered its very difficult if you're living there and the temptation of a place like Spain is obvious. Right across the water from Morocco. You can literally see it across the Gibraltar straight and its often people who are looking for work or just looking for a better life that they think that they're gonna find in Europe and in the course of reporting about this, a colleague of mine told me about a man whose job it is to collect the bodies and try to figure out who they are and also who their families are an ultimately try to get them back to these families.

the person whose entire job is identifying, who has washed up on shore and trying to get their bodies back to their home countries, so they can be buried exactly that's right So, who is this man, and how exactly did he come into this very unique line of work? So I wanted to know that too, and earlier this year, when I was in southern Spain working on another story about migration and looked him up like I gave him a call. I told It was near by and I drove down to the city where he lives out his eat us, which is this port city, that son, the Tipp of Spain facing Morocco and we decide to meet her father was nearby, as is his name is,

in some order, is sixty one year old, father of seven. He is wearing a tie and suit jacket. On super hot day. He looks almost like someone. You d, expect to be a lawyer with an emphasis on this point. You guessed asset as people define, so he and I sat down. And he started to tell me about his life story. Weighs about human. This Martina turned out was a funeral home director has a mortuary enough. His eat us and eat come to the town a couple of decades back to start this business in doing what funeral homeowners do, which is to collect the bodies of the dead, prepare them hold way. I attended the family, but at the time of the nineties, he'd also been asked.

by the government to pick up the unclaimed bodies that turned up in his hit us, and these weren't always the bodies of migrants. It was often people who were just in town had died. One had claimed them, but then in ninety ninety nine there was a really big shipwreck. It was sixteen people who had been travelling from Morocco, their boat sank and their bodies washed ashore shortly afterward, and it was Martine that happened to be the one who was called to go, get them what I used to save what so he collected the bodies he brought them back to his funeral home started to prepare them

no one knows about it, but then, when he was taking off the close of one of the bodies, he found that there was a piece of paper in one of pockets. He opened up the paper in his others, a phone number on it more said: Villefort Inertia, no name but just phone number. So he the number and the man picked up. Eleven, roughly area Martine told him. You know I have the body of someone. I think you probably know because he had your phone number in his pocket now the person, what answer any questions and he hung up on Martine but before he did Martine had said

He's just take down my number. If you ve got a change of heart, Gimme a call. So two days later, the Ben did callback. He'd initially been scared to talk to Martine Ricky. Probably himself was an immigrant who didn't have paperwork, but this time he said he actually was the brother in law of the man whose body that martini found and Martine Tom look. I have the body I am a funeral homeowner. I can get it back to Morocco, but I'd really like to figure out who the other bodies belong to as well and could have

the spur of the moment. He had an idea which she proposed to the brother in law, which was he said that I would offer river. Allow me they're gonna hurt you. I will travel to verify. Look I'll! Give you a discount in trying to get this body back to your family. If you will help me figure out who the rest of the relatives are of the other dead who run the shipwreck, So what is the response from this man, the monarch areas? It will merely Deborah, thereby you out there I covered over, so them said yeah I'll help you with what you need to get the rest of the bodies back. So this was where Martine got into a bit

detective work rob Bilateral available about eight years ago. He figured that he'd had so many clues already from the clothes they you maybe the closed themselves, where the key in terms of figuring out who the dead were. So he went to a local judge in this town and asked if he could use those close to figure out who the rest of the people were use, because how worried for love the effort I gotta give us avoid. So what and was that he and the brother in law both went back to Morocco and they took the close to markets around this town, called on solemn figuring that If one person had come from this area, there must be others that had also come from the same area. So for they would arrive. They would talk to the local police and say that they were setting up a storm

in the local market, with all the clothes that they had brought. So people can come and see if they identified any of that wow, so he's literally laying these clothes taken from me is dead since you have washed ashore, he's leaving them out the centre of town and getting people to come in and you them as the identifying markers of their deceased loved ones. That's an extraordinary seemed to imagine the others would he did like. Sometimes they were rings or bracelets or other things that that could identify the person. You know, sometimes it's just a t shirt. a parachute that was a gift and then a relatively immediately recognise this and no Martine had the body. This is what he had chanced upon and they went from town to town Nobody, nobody, some familiar

by the end of this journey Martine, had found all of the family members of the people who had perished on this boat. So all sixteen bodies, yeah every single body from that shipwreck was identified, its remarkable that a single funeral home owner acting I really on his own, is able to accomplish that. No one thought that she was going to. I mean he said that even the judge, who had given him permission to take the clothes to Morocco didn't expect anything to come of this trip, and then it would be a waste of time you know complete. Opposite. He figured out who the families were, something that the spanish government had even been able to take over, and I remember area have area of travel

but you know in getting to know the families he ran into a big problem now running that oughta give up. I guess I give you one, which was that these families were poor. The reason why their relatives had made this journey had died was because they were looking for a better life and the family members back at home. They didn't have anything to pay to reap treat the bodies. The cost is thousands of euros, and these were often people that we're living in small clapboard houses on the edges of town Martine is now sitting in their homes, telling them that he wants to help them get their relatives back, but it's going to cost something and their thing you need to get. My son back my son's body. So what does he do? He has these sixteen people's relatives back in Spain. They can't afford the cost of.

getting them repatriated. So what happens so I figured out how to get these bodies back regardless some of the family, Rachel a chip in a little bed. He tried, as best as he could, to reduce the cost and the bodies make it their to Morocco and get buried, but you gotta remember like, even though he did make very much money off of this. This wasn't his main line of work either this. If anything, was like a really fulfilling pro bono project and for the next few years things kind of went back to normal. He had other clients back enough has hit. Us may continue to bear

but then they started to become more migrant, sewer washing up ashore in Spain and what had been a kind of one off pro bono project for him started to become an increasingly large part of his business, and why is that so? Starting in two thousand and ten, there was a crisis involving both refugees and migrants that began to touch all parts of Europe and are really came to a head around two thousand and fifteen, and the part that got the most attention had to do with refugees. Leaving countries like Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan,

and coming to countries like Germany and France. So these were people fleeing war, torn countries and arriving in Northern Europe right, but is all this was going on? There were also these waves of people trying to get into southern Europe from North Africa and West Africa. These people were, in some cases, also fleeing conflict, or they were a fear of political persecution or extremely poor and financially desperate, and in the years after two thousand and fifteen Europe starts to shut down its boy is overland or at least start making harder to get in that stops the flow of people coming in overland, but it doesn't do much to stop the people coming in over the water into Southern Europe and its that war, a route that is a lot more dangerous and that's what team has been seeing face to face and Spain over the years is more

bodies washed ashore at what is a start to look like former chain when this is no longer a one off, but instead this is happening all the time it means is. Phone is basically constantly ringing now, instead of trying to contact the families, families or trying to contact him, there are people from all over who are calling him to try to find out if he has their relatives and at the same time, the police and the other institutions and the governments are the ones that are calling him to tell them that they ve got more bodies that they can't figure out who the relatives are, because that's not part of what they do. He's is getting overloaded, basically with a number of requests and he's also become the person that people

go to. As the first point of contact to try to find a missing relative whose died at sea, I'm curious what these calls are like water people sang to Martine when they reach out to him. He will. I asked Martine if he could tell me about one of these cars and if he could take me inside one of these cases, He went ass. Nothing so Martine told me about a call the he got earlier this year in April. I just say it yourself this initiative are giving mosquito? Then the man in a coin said that his name was. You said he was in a mom from a local mosque lodge abolition. Sally around a saloon in order to explain the two young men had gone missing. The idea said here

thanks said they had left Morocco in a boat and we're going to Spain or Portugal. They saw no sovereign sit down people system. Why don't you see what I'm into and their families didn't know They were dead or alive, stalled, almost City Brigham Tunnel in other northern. Why restaurant age and at the end of the message, the man you serve ass, much mounting DNS one idea was the same? Can you take this case? I can you help us find these men here or there back.

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to be honest, this is something that I eat. All your visit New York Times cooking for inspiring new recipes to add to your holiday table, find it all at ten t cooking dot com sonic. What happens after Martine gets that call from this important. What does he do? Soup first off? He says that he'll take the case and he gets some photos from the mom.

And in strict uses photos to make a case file. The men are in their twenties, he's, got their deeds of birth, their names, and these are the files that Martine uses to show the police to see if they ve found anybody that might be a match, and initially the police tell him that they dont have anybody that fits these description, so Martine puts those files away, but then, some weeks later, it's the beginning of June and the police give Martina call back and they say actually we have another body, it seems to have slipped through the cracks, and this is a problem there. They get so many bodies that sometimes their forgotten, and in this case the body was in an overflow morgue for a number of weeks, so immediately Martinez at ten. I shoot up because he thinks this might be

one of the men that the mom had told him about earlier, and he asked the police for pictures of the clothing. They send. Those pictures to him and their great overalls with paint. So now Martine has kind of something to go off of and with the imams help Martine contacts, the family members and he gets to the sister of one of the men. She has a look at the pictures and she says I know these clothes. They belong to my brother and sonic. Who is This man, he his name was Ashraf Amir. He was twenty seven years old when he died. He was from tangier which,

the city on Morocco Northern Coast- and he was a mechanic. His sister said that he didn't know how to read or write, and it wasn't the first time that he had tried to come to Spain. she said that he had made the journey before he had been caught. Deported, sent back and tried life again in Morocco. She didn't know that he was gonna. Do this time. No one in the family apparently did, but his sister said that he'd been acting strange during the time before he disappeared that the family was going to move to a new house rose and he'd said things like. Oh I'm not going to be with you at the next house and poorly

but where you acting this way- and he wouldn't really say, but he said to them- to take care of his mom, because his mom had diabetes. So on April thirteenth, he went to work, but at the end of work he didn't go home went to smuggling boat and he was still wearing those overalls with paint that is sister recognised. That's what he was where and when he got up and the boat took off some time afterwards sank and his? body continue to float in the water for some period of time before its washed ashore in Spain

and ended up in a morgue for weeks, and so once Martine understands that this body is a schroff. How does he starts to try to get out of body back to his family in Tangier there's a lot. That's informed me. He has to go see the judge to decide whether this is enough evidence that there's been identification or not. Sometimes the judge actually wants a dna tests to happen so that to process takes weeks and in late June. He invited me to come be with him during the last part of this process, which was when he was gonna, go collect that body and prepare it to go back to Morocco, hair and what is that

like. What do you see? What I met with him early in the morning is first, stop was the court house where he was going to collect the papers. We're gonna allow him to be able to take possession of the body from the more so we meet there. He, there before me and had already talked the judge, and I followed him to a town called caddies, and this is where the body was in a more and if in an industrial area on the outskirts of town from there, we drove back. It was pride, other half hour to where's funeral home is where he puts on hazmat suit to get ready to do the next part of the work to your inside

the room where he is starting to prepare a draft body you're in there with him. It's there it and is still in a body bag. So no one scene it yet and we opened up the body bag to see a shrug off, and it's just a hard site does You can hardly recognize that this is the body of a man. It's been so decomposed at this point and Martine spends about an hour or so embalming the body, it's a very kind of precise and clinical process, because he has to mix these chemicals and inject the body, but at the same time, like Martine realises that basically, his at last has that are going to touch this body before us

goes home and that there is like a certain somber news to what's happening to, even though he obviously doesnt know this man, I wonder, what's going to your mind as you're watching all of this it's it's really hard. I've seen a lot of of people's remains over the course of reporting in. I wrote about Mexico for many years when there was an extremely violent war with drug cartels,

I saw many corpses of people in Haiti after the earthquake that happened in two thousand and ten, but to see this kind of thing happening in Spain is truly heartbreaking, because this is a country that you don't expect to see these kinds of horrors and- and yet you still do. This is a sign of Spain that you don't see every day when Spain, as is being betrayed, it's a very dark side and is behind closed doors. And it's what you see in this funeral home without trust body, So when this embalming process it you're watching as over what happens to Ashraf spotty the sweat the end Martine does a kind of

as them funeral right that he learned from a mom that he tries to replicate himself. He sprinkles some herbs, unaddressed body, he wrapped the body in a green shroud that has lines from the Koran on it, and then he takes the body into the freezer, which is the last step before it gets repatriated. Back to Morocco, a chef was put onto a bow, went back across the Mediterranean, his family. The day before he arrived head dug his grave. The next day was the funeral and they said goodbye to him. His mother still visits the grave every Friday according to sister. so a martini has given this family is not just a fitting and proper ending, but

A whole new way to experience Ashraf death enter, keep honouring him there is actually a place to go. He he's basically given them closer. I've met many families over the course of the years that have lost loved ones in migration and they disappeared, and it's a big difference when you're able to have a grave site, a body in some sense that the person actually died and hasn't just vanished and an that's really key to what Martinez able to do, and at this point just how many. the family is. Has Martine done this very thing for provided closure, where none would have been possible by identifying bodies, I mean he's really lost count of how many times he's done. Thus he says it might be eight hundred times it is pro

more than that and there's gonna be more after this like this is a daily occurrence. This is what he does. I keep thinking back to the beginning, of this story and how, when Martine started doing this work, he never expected it would be central to his business with seemingly all that he does so. I have to ask

How is he still doing this when the families that he works with are unable to cover the costs? He'll tell you that the he's in a worse position now than he was when he started this by almost any metric. That first time that I meant Martine at the cafe. He told me that he'd gone to another part of Spain the day before to try to collect the body and that before he took off, he had to decide whether he was going to use is money to buy the gasoline to get there or to get groceries. Martinez not making money in this and if anything and in some cases, he's probably losing money.

Given that this is literally a hardship for Martine ended, he keeps doing it anyway. What have you come to understand after all this time with them is deeper motivation here? Why does he keep doing it? I mean he's doing this because nobody else well, if, if he doesn't do this, these bodies are just going to go into an unmarked grave somewhere, and I think the thing that terrifies Martine more than just kind of looking at sometimes he's recognisable faces data day is the kind of apathy that you're starting to see in Spain around the fact that so many people or or dying he's a first to tell you that no one should have to do this job. Don't you have to see this kind of stuff you every day and you can see that its affecting him?

in others, one point where we were driving around us: you see it s and will you give him a lot of Romania mingled onto them He was telling me about seeing these that. He got of a group of people who are about to take off in boats to come to Spain, content of anything November brand. You can see people are laughing and happy and really cited for the big adventure of going to your view of what the one they are more dialogue and he got this video justice. Getting ready to prepare the body of one of the people who had died, making the exact same trip the guy's a bathroom. He just guess this horrible feeling. He told me that in thirty

forty years when all this is over there we're going to look back at this time, say the Amazon better about. I may come about and ask ourselves like what kind of monsters living in Europe the society that we could have stood by and just watched as people drowned, trying to seek a new wife, but I've gotta get familiar, how did we let people die this way? That's that The question that charging him when he goes to work every day: doesn't want to be one of those monsters. He wants to be trying to do what little he can. If anything, can't stop these people from dying, but at least he can get a body back and try to give closer to a family.

Thank you very much. Wearily proceeded. Thank you, Michael holding back the walls, Fargo Active cash visa card as a proud supporter of the daily for some life's a series of planned moments for everyone else, we're just living it. That's why the new, while Spargo active cash credit card, is real. I Friday, with unlimited two percent cash rewards. Unpurchased says whether its last minute stations, impromptu dinners or taking that scuba class. The well Spargo active cash card is there with unlimited two percent cash rewards through life's moments, term supply learn more at whilst Fargo dot com, sash active

Hush hears what else you need. Turning today, on Tuesday, the House comedy scrutinising the January sixth attack on the? U S: Kapital issued ten new subpoenas of former Trump Administration officials, tightening its focus on the officials, efforts to overturn the results of the election. Those subpoena include troms, former senior adviser, Stephen Miller and Nicholas Luna Troms Personal Assistant, who was reportedly inside the oval office, as the president pressured his vice president might pets to refuse to certify Joe Biden victory. So far. The committee has issued thirty five subpoenas, an evaluation. You think affect your manage a management style. Do you think it?

you become more arrogant and how you did it for a question. In his first interview since being ousted as the ceo of we work, the coup working start up I don't know man told the times that the companies sky hi valuation of newly fifty billion dollars, mistakenly led him to leave. He was leading the company in the right way. So, yes, devaluation made us feel like we were right, which, We feel that whatever style I was leaving out was a correct style. I do think it is under Newman's leadership. We work, including its value, plunged by tens of billions of dollars, its original plans for an appeal or withdrawn, and thousands of its workers were laid off and at some point I do think I think that's what rabies is getting hinted that maybe point to my head. I do think that some pointed

to these episode was produced by Rochelle Banjo and Caitlin Roberts. It was edited by a needle bondage contains original. by Michel Banjo see Daniel Damn power and Marion Lozano and was engineered by Chris. Would our theme music is by Jim plundered and then lands of Wonderingly. that's it for they. I Michael BAR, see tomorrow.

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