Indigenous Remains Repatriated By The Netherlands To Caribbean Island Of St. Eustatius - The World News |link| Jun 2026

After three years of negotiations, the remains of three individuals were officially handed over to representatives of the St. Eustatius government and the Indigenous Kalinago Council. During the ceremony in Leiden, Dutch State Secretary for Culture and Media, Gunay Uslu, issued a formal apology. “For centuries, the Netherlands collected and retained human remains without the consent of their descendants,” she stated. “We took not only bones but dignity. Today, we begin to return what was never ours to take.”

A minute of silence was observed for the thousands of Indigenous remains still held in Dutch soil—literally and metaphorically. After the ceremony, the remains were placed in climate-controlled transport containers and flown to St. Eustatius on a Royal Netherlands Air Force flight, accompanied by a Statian delegation. The Dutch government funded the entire repatriation, including future DNA analysis efforts if requested by the community. After three years of negotiations, the remains of

Leiden University acknowledged that the remains entered its anatomical collection without documented consent, a common practice during an era when Indigenous skeletons were classified as “ethnographic specimens” rather than human relatives. After the ceremony, the remains were placed in

The airport excavation site, known as Golden Rock , is a significant late Saladoid settlement. However, recent excavations in 2021 at the same location led to an outcry due to practices that the local community deemed disrespectful, eventually leading to a halt in those works. known as Golden Rock

Netherlands repatriates indigenous remains to Caribbean isle

The repatriation ceremony was not merely administrative. Following the formal signing of transfer documents, the three wooden crates containing the remains were wrapped in white cloth and carried by local rangers along a procession route through the historic Lower Town. Elders from the local community, joined by representatives from the wider Caribbean Indigenous diaspora, sang traditional songs of return and offered tobacco and sea salt.