Amnesty International calls for urgent action for men deported to Eswatini

CAPE TOWN (AP):

International rights group Amnesty International called Friday for urgent action from authorities in the African nation of Eswatini to give five men deported there by the United States access to lawyers and explain why they’ve been held in a maximum-security prison for two months without charges.

Amnesty said it is raising the cases of the men from Jamaica, Cuba, Laos, Vietnam and Yemen, who in mid-July were sent to the southern African nation with a reputation for rights abuses, as part of the Trump administration’s third-country deportation programme.

The US has said it also wants to deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Eswatini. His wrongful deportation to his native El Salvador has become a flashpoint in the administration’s immigration crackdown.

Lawyers for the five men sent to Eswatini said they are being held at the Matsapha Correctional Centre, a maximum-security prison. Eswatini authorities have declined to say where they are, citing security reasons.

“The Eswatini authorities must officially disclose the five men’s whereabouts, immediately grant them regular and confidential access to their lawyers, and provide legal grounds for their detention,” Amnesty said.

The US Department of Homeland Security said the five were all serious criminals who had been convicted of offences including murder and child rape, and had all been in the US illegally and had deportation orders.

Their lawyers said they had served their criminal sentences in the US before being sent to Eswatini to be held in a prison without charges. The men are being represented by three separate US-based lawyers.

The US has sent deportees to at least four African countries since July under President Donald Trump’s hard-line approach to immigration, including South Sudan, Eswatini, Rwanda and Ghana. It has an agreement to deport migrants to another nation, Uganda, although no deportations there have been announced.

The Trump administration’s deportation programme has faced accusations that it is sending deportees to third countries where they have no ties and where they are likely to be denied due process. Homeland Security has said the US is “using every tool available to get criminal illegal aliens out of American communities and out of our country”.