HRW Says US Deportations to African Third Countries Violate International Law
- Human Rights Watch accused the US of deporting over 500 migrants to African countries where they are not citizens since Donald Trump returned to office in 2025
- The campaign group said deportees in several African countries faced arbitrary detention, ill-treatment, and were at risk of being sent home to face torture or persecution
- The US Department of Homeland Security defended the policy, saying third-country removals were an essential public safety tool to remove dangerous criminals from American streets
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Human Rights Watch (HRW) has declared that the United States government is breaking international law by deporting migrants to African countries where they hold no citizenship, accusing Washington of deliberately engineering human suffering to discourage illegal migration.
In a report published by the campaign group, HRW said more than 500 people had been transferred to African third-party countries since Donald Trump returned to the White House in 2025, based on figures from US government data.
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What HRW found in six countries
The group interviewed 24 third-country nationals across Cameroon, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini and South Sudan. Several described being restrained in chains for roughly 18 hours during deportation flights, given no information about their destination, denied essential medication, and provided with little food or water throughout the journey.
HRW said deportees held in Eswatini, Ghana and South Sudan had been arbitrarily detained and subjected to ill-treatment while in custody. In Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and Ghana, some individuals were transferred to their countries of origin in circumstances that, the group argued, violated the principle of non-refoulement, the international rule that forbids sending people to places where they risk torture, cruel treatment, or threats to their lives.
At least a dozen people who identified as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender were sent to African states that criminalise same-s3x relations, including some who had previously been granted refugee protection in the United States on the grounds that they would face persecution if returned home.
Michael Garcia Bochenek, HRW's interim US programme director, said: "Deporting people to countries where they have never set foot is part of a US policy designed to cause human suffering as a means to deter migration."
HRW also cited an unnamed US official who told a Senate hearing that the aim was to threaten people with being "literally dropped in the middle of nowhere." "The point is to scare people," the group said.
US government defends the policy
The US Department of Homeland Security rejected the characterisation, telling the BBC that "third country removals are an essential public safety tool that remove the most dangerous criminal illegal aliens from our streets."
It added that Immigration and Customs Enforcement receives diplomatic assurances from receiving countries that removed individuals will be safe, and that once deportees leave ICE custody, the agency's responsibility ends.
White House spokesperson Lauren Bis told the BBC that those sent to third countries were either from nations that refused to accept their own nationals or covered by court orders blocking direct repatriation. She also said the administration would arrange free flights and a $3,000 payment for anyone who chose to return home voluntarily.
Equatorial Guinea, which took in 65 deportees, quickly transferred at least two of them back to their home countries. Eswatini, which received 32 deportees, said three individuals from Yemen, Belize and Laos had recently departed voluntarily. Burundi confirmed late last month that it had agreed to accept US deportees. None of the other named African countries has publicly responded to the HRW report.
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