WASHINGTON, United States — America is beginning to fly detained migrants to America’s infamous Guantanamo navy base in Cuba as a part of President Donald Trump’s crackdown on unlawful migration, officers stated Tuesday.
Guantanamo is primarily often called a controversial detention heart for suspects accused of terrorism-related offenses, however the base additionally has a historical past of getting used to carry migrants, and Trump final week ordered the preparation of a 30,000-person “migrant facility” there.
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“At present, the primary flights from the USA to Guantanamo Bay with unlawful migrants are underway,” White Home Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt stated on Fox Enterprise.
A US protection official advised AFP Tuesday afternoon that there’s a “flight scheduled at present to Naval Station Guantanamo Bay with a few dozen high-threat unlawful aliens.”
“They are going to be housed within the detention facility… however is not going to be co-located with high-value detainees at present on the detention facility,” the official stated on situation of anonymity.
This picture obtained from the US Division of Protection exhibits US Marines as they conduct preflight checks on a KC-130J Tremendous Hercules at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Level, North Carolina, on February 2, 2025, because it prepares to deploy troops to Naval Station Guantanamo Bay in Cuba to assist Migrant Holding Operations. US President Donald Trump has stated he needs to ship 30,000 “prison unlawful aliens” to the infamous Guantanamo Bay US navy base in Cuba. | Picture by Orlanys Diaz Figueroa / US Division of Protection / AFP
Trump has launched what his second administration is casting as a significant effort to fight unlawful migration, trumpeting immigration raids, arrests and deportations on navy plane.
The president has made the difficulty a precedence on the worldwide stage as effectively, threatening Colombia with sanctions and big tariffs for turning again two planeloads of deportees.
The Guantanamo jail was opened within the wake of the September 11, 2001 assaults and has been used to indefinitely maintain detainees seized in the course of the wars and different operations that adopted.
‘Excellent place’
The circumstances there have prompted constant outcry from rights teams, and UN specialists have condemned it as a web site of “unparalleled notoriety.”
Democratic presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden each sought to shut the ability, however Congress has opposed efforts to shutter Guantanamo and it stays open to at the present time.
It nonetheless holds 15 individuals incarcerated for militant exercise or terrorism-related offenses, amongst them a number of accused plotters of the 9/11 assaults, together with self-proclaimed mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Based on US Southern Command, there are some 300 American navy personnel at Guantanamo supporting “unlawful alien holding operations.”
This picture obtained from the US Division of Protection exhibits US Marines boarding a KC-130J Tremendous Hercules at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Level, North Carolina, on February 2, 2025, as they deploy to Naval Station Guantanamo Bay in Cuba to assist Migrant Holding Operations.| Picture by Orlanys Diaz Figueroa / US Division of Protection / AFP
The bottom has for many years been used to carry Caribbean asylum seekers and refugees caught at sea, and was used within the Nineties to deal with tens of hundreds of Haitians and Cubans who fled crises of their homelands.
They had been accommodated in tent cities, with many ultimately despatched house after being held at Guantanamo for years.
Hundreds of undocumented migrants have been arrested since Trump’s January 20 inauguration, together with some accused of crimes.
An unknown quantity have been repatriated to Colombia, Mexico, Guatemala, Brazil and different international locations, and Trump has vowed to expel thousands and thousands.
US Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth on Monday described Guantanamo because the “excellent place” to detain migrants as he visited the border with Mexico — an space the place the Trump administration has boosted the nation’s navy presence in current weeks.
The Pentagon will present any crucial belongings “to assist the expulsion and detention of these in our nation illegally,” Hegseth stated.
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