A group of West African migrants who were deported from the United States to Ghana have now been sent on to their home countries, despite earlier assurances they would remain in Ghana, their lawyer told a court on Tuesday.
The U.S. had flown 14 migrants to Accra under a disputed deportation program. While authorities initially claimed all had been transferred to their respective countries, the deportees and their legal team later said 11 were being held at a military facility in Ghana.
Those 11 men, including four Nigerians, three Togolese, two Malians, and one each from Gambia and Liberia, filed a lawsuit last week demanding release. Eight of them argued they faced serious risks if returned home, citing “the risk of torture, persecution or inhumane treatment.”
READ ALSO: Ghana denies holding U.S.-deported migrants as lawyers allege abuse and secret detention
But their lawyer, Oliver Barker-Vormawor, told the court at a virtual hearing that their fears had already materialized.
“We have to inform the court that the persons whose human rights we are seeking to enforce were all deported over the weekend,” he reportedly told the court. “This is precisely the injury we were trying to prevent.”
Barker-Vormawor accused Ghanaian officials of rushing the deportations to block the case, adding that the migrants were not given access to legal counsel. He said some of his clients have since gone into hiding in their home countries.
READ ALSO: U.S. deportees challenge Ghana in court amid conflicting accounts of their whereabouts
The deportations come as the Trump administration intensifies efforts to expel immigrants, including those difficult to repatriate due to safety concerns. Human rights advocates have condemned the policy, warning that asylum-seekers are not being properly screened before removal.
Recently, the U.S. government has relied on third-country agreements to circumvent legal barriers on returning migrants to their homelands. Ghana, along with Eswatini, Rwanda, and South Sudan, has accepted deportees from the U.S. under these arrangements.
Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Justice told a federal court it cannot control how other governments treat deportees, emphasizing that Ghana had pledged not to return them to their home countries.
