US deportees claim they’re still held in Ghana, disputing officials’ account

At least 11 of the 14 immigrants deported by the US to Ghana are still being held in the West African nation the deportees and their lawyers told The Associated Press on Wednesday contradicting claims from Ghanaian authorities that the deportees have been sent to their home countriesThree of the deportees spoke to AP of the terrible conditions under which they are being held at a military camp the Bundase camp on the outskirts of Ghanas capital Accra They said the 11 deportees still in Ghana include four Nigerians three Togolese two Malians and one each from Gambia and LiberiaA group of 14 immigrants was first deported by the US to Ghana on September 6 the deportees said speaking to AP on the phone on the condition of anonymity for fear of their safety The AP could not independently verify their current locationAt least one of the 14 has returned to Gambia his home country according to his lawyer and US court filings Two others are believed to have been sent to their home country of Nigeria the Gambian said in a declaration filed in court He said the three of them were separated from the rest upon their arrival at the airport in AccraThe claims of the deportees that they are still being held in Ghana contradict that of Ghanas presidential spokesperson Felix Kwakye Ofosu who on Tuesday told AP that all 14 deportees had been sent to their home countries The Ghanaian government previously said the 14 deportees were all Nigerian besides one GambianOfosu did not immediately respond to APs inquiry on Wednesday The confusion surrounding the deportations reflects the dizzying pace at which the Trump administration has moved ahead with its immigration priorities which lawyers say has come at the cost of immigrants legal rights and sometimes puts their safety at riskIn interviews with AP the deportees said they were not told by US authorities why they were being deported They said some of them had already spent between 7 months to a year in US detention and that some had won their immigration cases The AP could not independently verify their court recordsThey also narrated a brutal deportation process during which some of them were handcuffed and put in a straitjacket on their flight to Ghana Some of us are getting sick and have malaria due to bad water and bad food one of the deportees said of their condition at the military camp where they said they are being held identifying himself as a Nigerian who had lived in the US for 12 yearsThey said nothing Nobody said anything about why they are deporting me or where they were sending me said the Togolese among them 28 US lawyers argued in court that the deportations to Ghana were an attempt by the Trump administration to evade US immigration laws that prevent some of the men with legal protections from being returned to their home countries where their wellbeing could be at risk A US judge said despite the legal protections her hands are tied once the migrants are in GhanaMeredyth Yoon lawyer who represents four of the deportees who remain in Ghana and litigation director at the Asian Americans Advancing Justice told AP that her clients safety is at risk They are afraid that the reason the Ghanaian government is insisting that they are not in the country is because they are afraid something will happen to them said YoonThe Trump administrations deportation programme has faced widespread criticism from human rights experts who cite international protections for asylumseekers and question whether immigrants will be appropriately screened before being deported Immigration and Customs Enforcement and its parent agency Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond Wednesday to a request for commentSending the deportees to their countries despite the legal orders prohibiting such over fear of their safety is part of a pattern by the US government of extreme indifferenceto the governments obligations and to the human consequences of its mass deportation campaign according to Maureen A Sweeney immigration lawyer and professor of law at the University of Maryland Carey School of LawThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever