Iran has confirmed that 120 nationals will be deported from the United States this week as part of President Donald Trump’s expanded immigration crackdown.
“120 people should be deported and flown home over the next couple of days,” foreign ministry consular affairs official Hossein Noushabadi told the Tasnim news agency on Tuesday. He said US immigration authorities had decided to deport around 400 Iranians, most of whom entered the country illegally.
According to The New York Times, roughly 100 Iranians who had sought refuge in the United States are being sent back under a rare agreement between Washington and Tehran, reached after several months of negotiations.
An aircraft chartered by US authorities reportedly left Louisiana on Monday evening and was expected to land in Tehran on Tuesday after a stopover in Qatar. The paper described the deportations as “the starkest push yet by the Trump administration to deport migrants even to places with harsh human rights conditions.”
Earlier this year, the US deported several Iranians, including Christians, to Central American countries such as Costa Rica and Panama. Under Trump, deportations have expanded to include individuals sent to their home countries or third countries with existing agreements.
The effects of these policies have also been felt in West Africa. Over the weekend, reports emerged that deportees from the US were stranded in Togo after being transported there by Ghana without documents or legal assistance.
Ghana’s President John Mahama had earlier disclosed that his country struck a deal to accept deportees from the region. Since then, eight to ten West Africans have been sent to Togo through informal border crossings.
Benjamin, a Nigerian national deported to Ghana, told AFP he and three others were sharing a single hotel room, relying on money from relatives in the US. He said an immigration judge had earlier ruled he could not be deported to Nigeria because of threats to his life linked to his past political activities.
Benjamin claimed he was beaten by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers after refusing to board a military plane. He and others were later detained in Ghana’s Dema Camp for over two weeks before being abandoned at the Aflao border crossing with Togo.
“We are in hiding right now because we have no type of documents, ID whatsoever,” said Emmanuel, a Liberian national who was also deported.
Both Benjamin and Emmanuel had been long-term US residents with green cards and American spouses. Emmanuel had been granted asylum during Liberia’s civil war and was fighting deportation in court when he was expelled.
Lawyers say many deportees, including a bisexual Gambian man, were sent to countries where they face persecution, despite court rulings protecting them.
The UN human rights office has urged Ghana to stop accepting deportees who risk torture or abuse if sent to third countries such as Nigeria, The Gambia, Togo, Mali, or Liberia.
The US State Department maintained its stance, saying: “We will pursue all appropriate options to remove aliens who should not be in the United States.”
Ghanaian and Togolese authorities have not issued statements on the situation.
In Nigeria, officials appeared unaware of any deportations involving its nationals through Ghana. Abdur-Rahman Balogun, spokesperson for the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM), said he had no information on the matter.
Alkasim Abdulkadir, media aide to Nigeria’s foreign minister, questioned why Nigerians were being sent to Ghana despite an existing bilateral deportation agreement with the US. “The agreement that we had with America is that they will send Nigerians back to Nigeria,” he said. “Maybe it’s a logistics issue.”