Rights group says US deportations to African countries are unlawful and exploit suffering

Human Rights Watch (HRW) has concluded in a new report that the deportation of migrants from the United States to third-party African countries is unlawful and exploits human suffering to discourage migration. The organisation says that many, if not most, of those sent away have no practical option other than returning to their home countries, regardless of the dangers awaiting them there.

According to US data cited by HRW, more than 500 people have been sent to African countries of which they are not citizens since Donald Trump returned to the White House in 2025.

The group's allegations

HRW says some countries that accepted deportees have arbitrarily detained them or sent them on to their home countries, where they risk persecution or torture. People sent to Eswatini, Ghana and South Sudan were allegedly held arbitrarily and ill-treated in detention. In Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and Ghana, deportees were returned to their countries of origin, potentially violating the principle of nonrefoulement.

The group cites an unnamed US official who reportedly told a Senate hearing that the administration's aim was to be able to threaten people with being dropped in the middle of nowhere. HRW's interim US programme director, Michael Garcia Bochenek, said that deporting people to countries they have never visited is part of a policy designed to cause suffering as a deterrent.

HRW interviewed 24 third-country nationals in six countries. Some described abusive treatment on deportation flights, including being chained for about 18 hours without knowing their destination, and being denied essential medication and sufficient food or water. At least a dozen people identifying as LGBT were sent to states that criminalise same-sex relations.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, a US lawyer told HRW that of 15 people from Colombia, Peru and Ecuador deported there in April, none remained by late September, and 11 had gone back to their home countries. Equatorial Guinea, which received 65 people, quickly sent at least two to their home countries.

Official responses

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) says third-country removals are an essential public safety tool and that it receives diplomatic assurances from destination countries that those removed will be safe. None of the African countries named has commented on the report. Eswatini, which took in 32 deportees, said three people from Yemen, Belize and Laos recently departed voluntarily for their home countries, and pledged to respect the rights and dignity of third-country nationals. Burundi announced late last month that it had agreed to accept migrants deported from the US.