Activists and human rights teams have accused United States President Donald Trump of utilizing African international locations as a “dumping floor” for criminals he needs to deport after 5 males have been deported from the US to the tiny kingdom of Eswatini.
On July 16, a deportation flight carrying 5 males from Vietnam, Jamaica, Laos, Cuba and Yemen, all of whom have been convicted of crimes within the US, landed in Eswatini, the final African nation ruled by a monarch with absolute energy. The deportations have been a part of Trump’s “third nation” plan to deport individuals whose personal international locations are unwilling to take them again.
Eswatini is the second African nation that the US has deported criminals to. Additionally this month, Washington stated it had sent eight “uniquely barbaric monsters” to conflict-torn South Sudan.
Final month, the US Supreme Courtroom allowed the deportations of overseas nationals to unrelated third international locations. Since then, worldwide rights teams and civil society teams from African nations have raised alarms of human rights abuses.
“The US authorities sees us as a felony dumpsite and undermines Emaswati [the people of Eswatini],” Wandile Dludlu, a pro-democracy activist and deputy president of the nation’s largest opposition motion, the Folks’s United Democratic Motion (PUDEMO), advised Al Jazeera. As a political social gathering, PUDEMO is a banned organisation in Eswatini.
So is Trump planning to make use of African nations as a “dumping floor” for deportees?
Who’re the 5 males Trump deported to Eswatini?
This month, Tricia McLaughlin, US Division of Homeland Safety assistant secretary, stated the deportation flight to Eswatini had taken away “people so uniquely barbaric that their dwelling international locations refused to take them again”.
“These wicked monsters have been terrorizing American communities however because of [Trump] they’re off of American soil,” she wrote in a post on X.
NEW: a protected third nation deportation flight to Eswatini in Southern Africa has landed— This flight took people so uniquely barbaric that their dwelling international locations refused to take them again.
These wicked monsters have been terrorizing American communities however because of @POTUS… pic.twitter.com/TsanIX8H4T
— Tricia McLaughlin (@TriciaOhio) July 16, 2025
With out sharing their names, McLaughlin confirmed the 5 have been nationals from Vietnam, Jamaica, Laos, Cuba and Yemen.
She stated all have been convicted criminals – together with for offences of kid rape, homicide, theft, gang ties and homicides – and had been given jail sentences so long as 25 years.
What settlement has the Trump administration made with Eswatini?
Trump rode to victory in final yr’s presidential election on the again of a marketing campaign with mass deportations as its centrepiece.
Since then, the Trump administration has been negotiating a third-country deportation settlement with a number of nations, together with Eswatini, which is able to permit it to deport overseas nationals convicted of significant crimes who’ve been rejected by their dwelling international locations.
Whereas the precise phrases stay labeled, the settlement between Eswatini and the US reportedly emerged after “months of sturdy high-level engagements”, the dominion’s performing spokesperson, Thabile Mdluli, stated.
Mdluli additionally stated the dominion would collaborate with the White Home and the Worldwide Group for Migration (IOM) “to facilitate the transit of those inmates to their international locations of origin”.
Nevertheless, “there aren’t any timelines at current” for his or her repatriation, she advised CNN in an interview.
Daniel Akech, a senior analyst for South Sudan on the Worldwide Disaster Group, advised Al Jazeera that some African governments are agreeing to obtain convicted deportees as a “goodwill gesture, aiming to enhance US ties and be in [Trump’s] good books”.
However he stated they’ve additionally “implicitly dismissed human rights issues and the shortage of transparency on how third nationals’ security is ensured”.
Akech stated the African Union and the United Nations may associate with receiving international locations to observe the method of US deportations “to make sure that the deportees are protected and their residing circumstances are good”.
“The areas the place these deportees keep may face conflicts, and this might require plans on how to make sure their security or protected switch inside the nation or exterior,” Akech stated.
What can we learn about Eswatini?
The mountainous Southern African kingdom is a tiny landlocked nation bordering South Africa and Mozambique and is considered one of a handful of nations which can be nonetheless absolute monarchies with absolute energy residing with the king, at present King Mswati III.
Beneath British colonial rule, which resulted in 1968, the nation was often called Swaziland. It was renamed by the king in 2018.
Mswati has dominated Eswatini since 1986 when he turned 18, succeeding his father, Sobhuza II, who died in 1982.
Now aged 57, Mswati has been criticised for suppressing political dissent. The World Financial institution stated greater than half of Eswatini’s 1.2 million individuals stay on lower than $4 a day.
The king is reported to have 11 wives, and his wealth is estimated at $200m to $500m, in accordance with an Related Press report.
Eswatini’s economic system is dominated by agriculture and small-scale manufacturing in addition to its sugar sector, which accounts for a considerable share of its export revenues. The nation is considered one of Africa’s largest sugar producers, exporting roughly $477m of sugar and sugar-related merchandise in 2023 – about 23 p.c of its complete exports.
What do individuals in Eswatini take into consideration Trump’s deportation plan?
Regional leaders and activists stated there’s a great deal of anger about it.
Dludlu described the “dumping” of convicted criminals as “distasteful and fraudulent conduct by His Majesty and his authorities within the face of the unprecedented public healthcare disaster” within the nation.
“That is attracting indignation from Emaswati for bare abuse of their sovereignty and territorial integrity as a nation and other people,” Dludlu advised Al Jazeera.
He stated PUDEMO and its supporters demand that the federal government and the US “reverse this absurd and unlawful but irrational determination to take criminals from the US when different nations search honest commerce, high quality training and different significant exchanges”.
Dludlu additional famous that the incoming deportees will solely add to the “overcrowded jail amenities which can be poorly run [in] dilapidated and outdated infrastructure”. Figures present that prisons in Eswatini operate at greater than 170 p.c of their capability.
Civil society teams – together with the Southern Africa Litigation Centre, the Swaziland Rural Girls’s Meeting and different regional NGOs – have threatened authorized proceedings in opposition to the Eswatini authorities over its acceptance of the 5 convicted criminals.
They argued that the detentions violate Eswatini’s personal Correctional Providers Act and different home legal guidelines and stated there is no such thing as a lawful foundation for imprisoning overseas nationals who lack authorized ties to the nation.
Chris Ogunmodede, a overseas affairs analyst aware of African diplomatic circles, stated there are a number of questions hovering over the settlement made with the Trump administration. These vary from the authorized justification used to authorise the deportees’ transfers, whether or not the boys have been knowledgeable and given consular entry, the length of their detentions and the phrases of the association with the US.
He added that Eswatini and South Sudan are “smaller economies with no geopolitical weight” on which White Home officers may simply “impose their will”.
What does the Eswatini authorities say?
In a public assertion, Mdluli stated the federal government assured the individuals of the dominion that the arrival of 5 third-country deportees from the US “poses no safety menace to the Nation”.
It acknowledged that the 5 prisoners could be housed in correctional amenities inside remoted models “the place comparable offenders are stored”.
Addressing the bilateral discussions with the White Home, she stated the “engagements thought of each avenue, together with rigorous danger assessments and cautious consideration for the security and safety of residents”.
Which different African nations does Trump hope to barter deportation offers with?
Along with Eswatini and South Sudan, Trump has mentioned third-country deportation offers with the leaders of Liberia, Senegal, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania and Gabon throughout a summit on the White Home this month.
Trump reportedly mentioned migration, together with the necessity for international locations to simply accept the return of their nationals who don’t have the precise to remain within the US and the potential of accepting deported residents of third international locations.
Tom Homan, Trump’s border tsar, stated the Trump administration hoped to forge offers with “many international locations” to simply accept deported migrants.
“If there’s a vital public menace or nationwide safety menace, there’s one factor for certain: They’re not strolling the streets of this nation. We’ll discover a third, protected nation to ship them to, and we’re doing it,” he stated.
Rwanda has confirmed it’s in talks with the Trump administration for the same deal whereas Nigeria stated it had rejected strain to make an settlement.
Which different international locations have thought of a third-country deportation coverage?
United Kingdom
The UK has explored third-country deportation insurance policies as a part of its efforts to handle irregular migration and asylum claims. Beneath the earlier Conservative authorities, the UK partnered with Rwanda in 2022 and deliberate to relocate asylum seekers to Rwanda for processing with the UK committing 370 million kilos ($497m) in improvement funding over 5 years in alternate.
The plan was first struck down by the UK Supreme Courtroom in November 2023 for violating worldwide human rights norms, given Rwanda’s insufficient asylum system and human rights issues. In response, the federal government enacted the Security of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Act 2024, which declared Rwanda a “protected nation” and restricted authorized challenges to the coverage.
After the Labour Celebration’s victory within the July 2024 elections, Prime Minister Keir Starmer swiftly terminated the Rwanda scheme.
Nevertheless, in Might, Starmer stated he was speaking to “a variety of international locations” about “return hubs”, the place undocumented immigrants might be despatched.
Israel
Equally, Israel applied a third-country deportation association focusing on African asylum seekers by sending them to international locations like Rwanda and Uganda from 2013 to 2018.
The federal government supplied $3,500 per particular person to these agreeing to go away.
In 2018, nonetheless, Israel’s Supreme Courtroom in impact dismantled the coverage, ruling it illegal partly because of the receiving international locations’ failure to ensure protections and uphold worldwide obligations underneath the Refugee Conference.
Ogunmodede stated the UK’s and Israel’s offers with African nations amounted to the “outsourcing of the migration drawback”.
He added that now, the US underneath the Trump administration is “utilizing a carrot and stick method to getting international locations all over the world to adjust to the issues that they need”.