68-year-old “38th foreign tourist to have died in Vale de Aburrá this year”
A Portuguese man, on holiday with his female partner, was discovered dead in the early hours of yesterday morning in Medellín, Colombia – in a region that has seen 38 foreign tourists die already this year.
Local news channels say everything points to the death, in his own bed, as being ‘natural’.
Élder Manuel Martínez Amaral was staying in the York Luxury Suites Hotel, writes noticiasaominuto.
But the truth is that “at least 15” of the deaths of foreign tourists this year have also been credited to natural causes, while 12 have been put down as the result of “murders (3), accidents (1) and suicides (8)”. The remaining 11 are “still under investigation”.
The fact that so many foreign holidaymakers have died in this particular area of Colombia – eight of them having taken their own lives – is “beginning to raise questions among authorities”, admits local paper El Colombiano – which remarks that the latest victim is the 19th tourist to have died in the ‘El Poblado’ district, which is actually “where most cases have been registered”.
That said, Mr Amaral’s body reportedly showed no signs of violence, nor were there any signs of any kind of forced entry into the hotel room.
Colombian news sources have stressed that “according to coroners office records” Medellín is not among the Colombian cities most notorious for violent deaths. This sounds as if it is meant to be reassuring, but elsewhere El Colombiano features an article entitled: “Medellín is the third Colombian city with the most violent deaths of foreign tourists this year”. The article was written a week ago. ND
Source material: noticiasaominuto/ Colombian news sources
