A Jamaican man deported by the US to Eswatini has been repatriated, authorities say
MANZINI, Eswatini (AP) — A Jamaican man who was among five migrants deported by the United States to Eswatini in Africa has been repatriated to his home country, Eswatini authorities and his lawyers said.
Orville Etoria, 62, was held in a maximum-security prison in Eswatini for more than two months without charges or access to legal counsel, his lawyers said Tuesday. They accused the U.S. of deporting him there unlawfully in mid-July.
The lawyers had said U.S. officials sent him to the southern African nation under the Trump administration’s third-country deportation program even though Jamaica was willing to take him back. They alleged Etoria and the four other men were then repeatedly denied visits by a lawyer while they were held at the prison.
Etoria’s lawyers at the New York-based Legal Aid Society confirmed his repatriation, saying in a statement that he had been arbitrarily detained in Eswatini. The case was “a grave injustice that underscores the dangers of the U.S. government’s continued third-country deportations,” the statement said.
The U.S. has sent more than 30 deportees to at least four African countries since July under the new program: South Sudan, Eswatini, Rwanda and Ghana. It has an agreement with another Africa nation, Uganda, though no deportations there have been announced yet. Rwanda said it has ultimately agreed to receive up to 250 deportees.
The U.S. has said it wants to deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Eswatini, a tiny kingdom bordering South Africa where the king holds absolute power and has been accused of clamping down on pro-democracy movements.
Abrego Garcia’s wrongful deportation to his native El Salvador and ongoing case has become a flashpoint in U.S. President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigration.
Etoria was repatriated on Sunday with the assistance of the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration, Thabile Mdluli, the Eswatini government’s acting spokesperson, said in a statement.
She said there were “engagements” with the other four men from Cuba, Laos, Vietnam and Yemen to have them sent home.
The five men were described as dangerous criminals by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. It said they had been sent to Eswatini because their home countries refused to take them back.
Eswatini, in an apparent contradiction of that, said they were only there in transit and would be sent home.
The five men had been convicted of serious crimes including murder and child rape, and all were in the U.S. illegally and had deportation orders, DHS said. Their lawyers said they had all completed their criminal sentences but were sent overseas to be held in another prison without charges or due process.
The Trump administration’s third-country program has been criticized by lawyers and human rights experts, who say it results in sending migrants to countries they have no ties with and where they could be denied their legal rights by repressive governments. DHS has said those in the U.S. illegally should leave voluntarily or they could be deported to “any number of third countries.”
International rights group Human Rights Watch released a statement Tuesday criticizing the program, saying it “violates international human rights law and is designed to instrumentalize human suffering as a deterrent to migration.”
The group also claimed to have seen details of some of the deportation agreements the U.S. has with African countries, including that the U.S. agreed to pay Rwanda’s government around $7.5 million to take up to 250 deportees. The U.S. will give Eswatini $5.1 million to take up to 160 deportees, Human Rights Watch said.
No details of those agreements have been disclosed by either the U.S. or the African countries.
Two court cases have been filed in Eswatini against authorities over the detention of the men there. One is demanding they are given in-person access to lawyers, while another case brought by several nonprofit organizations argues their detention is unconstitutional.
Hearings for the first case have been repeatedly delayed, while government officials failed to appear for a hearing in the second case.
A Mexican man was repatriated this month after spending two months detained in an unspecified location in South Sudan. He was among several deportees held for weeks before that at a U.S. military base in Djibouti. Six other deportees are still believed to be held in South Sudan.
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Imray reported from Cape Town, South Africa.
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AP Africa news: https://apnews.com/hub/africa
By NOKUKHANYA MUSI and GERALD IMRAY
Associated Press
