The funerals for the 26 teenage Nigerian migrant girls is ongoing in Salerno, Southern Italy, where a day of mourning has been declared.
Post-mortem examinations on the bodies of the girls, who were found dead in the Mediterranean in early November confirmed they almost all drowned at sea, reports Italian news agencies.
According to the post-mortems carried out in Salerno in southern Italy, the girls aged 14 to 18 died of asphyxiation in the water, most of them when the inflatable dinghy they were travelling on sank.
One girl suffered a wound to her liver. Two of the dead were pregnant. The autopsies found no recent trace of physical or sexual violence.
The bodies of the victims were found floating in the water by a Spanish military ship and brought to Italy on November 3rd after two separate rescue operations.
Family members who survived the disaster have identified some of the victims. In other cases, investigators managed to contact relatives after discovering phone numbers inside the victims' clothing.
A white rose will be placed on each coffin, while smaller roses will be placed for the two unborn children.