The authorities in St. Kitts and Nevis, an eastern Caribbean nation, said that they are currently investigating the circumstances surrounding the discovery of 19 bodies floating at sea.
Around 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday local time, the St. Kitts and Nevis Coast Guard received a report about a vessel drifting off the coast of Nevis. The boat was partially submerged and contained human remains. The boat was towed back to St. Kitts where medical and police officials are investigating.
The Associated Press reported that “it was a fishing boat, which isn’t typically found in the Caribbean.” Police Commissioner James Sutton confirmed this. “We’re not sure, but we think this vessel came from the coast of West Africa.”
Sutton said that officials are now faced with the difficult task of determining the exact number and identifying the bodies. He said that the advanced state of decomposition has made it very difficult.
It is the first time in recent history that a discovery of this kind has been made in the Twin Island Nation.
The Dominican Republic’s forensic authorities worked in August to identify at least 14 bodies that were mostly decomposed and found on an abandoned ship 10 nautical miles off its northern coast. According to documentation found near the bodies, the Dominican Republic Navy stated that the 14 skeletons looked like they belonged to people from Senegal or Mauritania.
Officials from the Coast Guard said that in 2007, three bodies believed to have come from North Korea were found two days after authorities discovered a dilapidated, empty boat. A Coast Guard official said that a Japanese fishing vessel picked up a body floating near the coast of Sakata, Yamagata Prefecture. Two more bodies washed ashore on a beach nearby an hour and a half later. The bodies were not in good condition, but they did have a North Korean lapel pin.
