Eswatini receives third batch of migrants deported by the US

Johannesburg (AP) — Four more African migrants deported from the United States arrived in Eswatini, authorities said Thursday.

This is the third batch of deportees that the Trump administration has sent to Eswatini. They are the latest of more than 40 deportees sent to Africa as part of largely secretive agreements with at least seven African nations that rights groups and others have protested.

Others that have struck third-country deportation deals with the Trump administration include Ghana, Rwanda, Uganda, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and South Sudan.

The latest group of deportees that arrived in landlocked Eswatini included a Tanzanian, a Sudanese and two Somali nationals who would be repatriated to their respective countries of origin, the government said in a statement. It didn’t name them or say where they are being held.

Since last July, the U.S. has sent at least 19 people in three batches to Eswatini as part of its hard-line approach toward immigration. The U.S. said the first group of five men sent to Eswatini in July were convicted criminals who had deportation orders. A Jamaican man in that first group was repatriated to his home country in September.

The Eswatini government on Thursday said another third-country national had since received his travel documents and “will be departing the country shortly.” It added that talks with other countries of origin for the remaining third-country nationals are ongoing.

After the arrival of the latest deportees, the Eswatini government said it “reiterates its commitment to ensuring that the rights and dignity of the third-country nationals are upheld while they remain in the country.”

The deportations to Eswatini, a tiny kingdom bordering South Africa, where the king has full power and has been accused of suppressing pro-democracy movements, have sparked protests from civic groups there.

The Trump administration has spent at least $40 million to deport roughly 300 migrants to countries other than their own in Africa, Central America and elsewhere, according to a report compiled by the Democratic staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and released last month.

Follow AP’s global migration coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/migration