Asylum seeker died of heart attack

A Nigerian asylum seeker who died while being deported from Switzerland suffered a fatal heart attack, an autopsy report has found.

The heart attack was probably brought on by the fact that the man had been on hunger strike and was in a stressed state at the time, according to the Zurich cantonal justice authorities’ report published on Monday.

The 29-year-old was suffering from a serious heart condition that had not been diagnosed. The report noted that the condition is “almost impossible” to detect while a patient is alive.

The Nigerian, a convicted drug dealer, died at Zurich airport in March. He had refused to leave the country and had been forcibly restrained while boarding a deportation flight.

The Federal Migration Office paid out SFr50,000 ($43,500) to his family as a “humanitarian gesture” towards the family and to help to pay for the funeral costs.

The death resulted in all deportation flights being temporarily suspended. On May 21 the Migration Office announced the flights would resume, with extra medical supervision, except those to Nigeria.

It decided to suspend flights to Nigeria until the cause of death of the Nigerian asylum seeker was known. The flights are now expected to resume in July, the office told the Swiss News Agency on Monday.

The human rights organisation Augenauf has called for forced deportations to be halted and says extra medical supervision on flights will not ensure that further deaths are prevented.

swissinfo.ch and agencies