ABSTRACT
The European-Moroccan borders are justly reputed to be deadly for migrants from sub-Saharan Africa. Yet we have little information on how the Moroccan state identifies, sorts, and categorizes the lifeless and undocumented bodies of migrants found by the Moroccan police. Based on an ethnographic study conducted in Morocco and Guinea, this chapter examines the identification procedure implemented by a plurality of actors, including families, embassies, associations, and the companions of deceased migrants. It also describes the fate that the Moroccan state reserves for the bodies and personal belongings of unidentified deceased migrants—who become ‘stateless’ foreigners ‘without family’—which are seized by the Moroccan state through the intermediary of the Crown Prosecutor. The state thus becomes the main heir to the property left by these ‘stateless’ migrants.
