Trump Admin Also Seeking To Send Deported Migrants To War-Torn Libya: Report

The Trump administration could soon start sending migrant deportees to Libya, a country engulfed in armed violence and political turmoil for over a decade.

Quoting officials familiar with the matter, CBS News detailed that deportations could start as soon as this week. If deportation flights are effectively carried out, third-country deportees would find themselves in a country divided into two factions since a civil war broke out in 2011: one ruled by a UN-backed government in Tripoli and another one by strongman General Khalifa Haftar, who controls the eastern half of the country and some enclaves in the west.

The administration would also be sending deportees to a country for which the State Department has a Level 4 travel advisory. It warns Americans not to travel there due to "crime, terrorism, unexploded landmines, civil unrest, kidnapping, and armed conflict."

The outlet also detailed that Libya is also a country transited by many migrants who try to reach Europe. Advocates and U.S. officials have received accounts of mistreatment and even torture in detention centers in the country.

Trump officials are also seeking to send migrants to another African country: Rwanda. The country's foreign minister, Olivier J.P. Nduhungirehe made the announcement late Sunday on a state broadcaster, Rwanda TV. He said the country's government was in "early stage" talks about receiving third-country deportees from the U.S.

"We are in discussions with the United States," Nduhungirehe said in the interview, which was reported by Reuters. "It has not yet reached a stage where we can say exactly how things will proceed, but the talks are ongoing... still in the early stages."

Rwanda has long positioned itself as a potential partner to Western nations seeking to curb migration, offering to provide asylum to migrants or house them as they await resettlement elsewhere, sometimes in return for payment. But critics say that, like Libya, sending asylum seekers to Rwanda is also unsafe, citing the country's poor record on human rights, limited resources, and the authorities' previous intimidation and surveillance of migrants and refugees.

Most notably, Rwanda struck a deal with Britain in 2022 to accept some asylum seekers for their claims to be processed— but it sparked humanitarian concerns and it was eventually shelved.

The Washington Post also reported this week that the Trump administration urged the Ukrainian government to accept third-country deportees. The outlet added that it is not clear how Kyiv responded to the request. So far Ukraine is not known to have received U.S. deportees from other countries.