When Faraje Jarjoura had a seizure in the water, his daughter and son pulled him limp to the beach and began to revive him. Unfortunately, unsuccessfully. It took three quarters of an hour for the doctor to arrive. But he could only confirm the death of a man who, although he was taking medication for his heart, had no problems until the last moment.
What the devastated family went through after that seems unbelievable. According to CBS News, it took eight hours for morgue workers to arrive for the deceased. The previously covered body lay on the couch the whole time.
When the mother returned home with both children, she had to wait several weeks for the repatriated remains. The Canadian consular service mediated the transport for ten thousand Canadian dollars (170 thousand CZK).
But when the coffin arrived, the family discovered that it was not their father, but a complete stranger, which was obvious at first glance. The man in the coffin was about twenty years younger, with thick hair and tattoos on his body. It was supposed to be a Russian citizen.
The Cuban foreign minister apologized
Since then, the family has been trying to find out where the father’s body really is. “I did everything in my power to get an answer. I just want to know where he is,” said the distraught daughter Miriam on the day of her father’s funeral.
The case caused such an uproar in Canada that Foreign Minister Mélanie Jolyová had to deal with it. She intervened with her Cuban counterpart, Bruno Rodriguez, who assured her that the Cuban authorities were investigating the matter.
“We are deeply concerned about the situation the family is in,” Joly said. On Network X, Rodriguez apologized to the family and friends of the deceased and expressed regret for the “unfortunate incident”.
To this day, however, the family has not received any information from Cuba about where the repatriation agency actually sent the father’s body. According to the Swiss daily Blick, it was mistakenly buried in Russia. Meanwhile, the Consulate of the Russian Federation in Montreal said it could neither confirm nor deny information that the body mistakenly sent to Canada belonged to a Russian citizen.
The Jarjour family comes from Aleppo, Syria, where the father worked as a florist. They came to Canada in 2016, fleeing civil war.
Transporting a patient from abroad will cost millions
Finance
