Activists and human rights groups have accused United States President Donald Trump of using African countries as a “dumping ground” for criminals he wants to deport after five men weredeportedfrom the US to the tiny kingdom of Eswatini.On July 16, a deportation flight carrying five men from Vietnam, Jamaica, Laos, Cuba and Yemen, all of whom have been convicted of crimes in the US, landed in Eswatini, the last African country governed by a monarch with absolute power. The deportations were part of Trump’s “third country” plan to deport people whose own countries are unwilling to take them back.Eswatini is the second African nation that the US has deported criminals to. Also this month, Washington said it hadsent eight “uniquely barbaric monsters”to conflict-torn South Sudan.Last month, the US Supreme Courtallowedthe deportations of foreign nationals to unrelated third countries. Since then, international rights groups and civil society groups from African nations have raised alarms of human rights abuses.“The US government sees us as a criminal dumpsite and undermines Emaswati [the people of Eswatini],” Wandile Dludlu, a pro-democracy activist and deputy president of the country’s largest opposition movement, the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), told Al Jazeera. As a political party, PUDEMO is a banned organisation in Eswatini.So is Trump planning to use African nations as a “dumping ground” for deportees?Who are the five men Trump deported to Eswatini?This month, Tricia McLaughlin, US Department of Homeland Security assistant secretary, said the deportation flight to Eswatini had taken away “individuals so uniquely barbaric that their home countries refused to take them back”.Advertisement“These depraved monsters have been terrorizing American communities but thanks to [Trump] they are off of American soil,” she wrote in aposton X.NEW: a safe third country deportation flight to Eswatini in Southern Africa has landed— This flight took individuals so un
Source: Al Jazeera
