Guyana confirmed on Saturday that it had received six deportees from the United States, the first group sent to the South American nation under a bilateral agreement struck with the Trump administration. Guyana's Foreign Secretary Robert Persaud said the six nationals from Cuba and Afghanistan arrived in the country on Friday after being vetted by his administration and found to have no criminal background. Four of the group are Cuban and two are Afghan, according to local reporting, with ages ranging from 20 to 36.
Persaud told the Associated Press that the arrangement followed an extended period of diplomatic contact. He said his administration reached the agreement to host the deportees after months of negotiations, and added that the United States had made no further requests since the first transfer. The deal is limited in duration and scope. It will last for one year and does not constitute permanent resettlement.
Third-country removal has become a defining feature of the administration's immigration enforcement since the start of Trump's second term. Rather than returning deportees to their countries of citizenship, officials send them to states with which they have no legal or personal connection. Deportees often have no familiarity with the country they are sent to and sometimes do not even speak the language. Officials have defended the practice on practical grounds. Trump officials have justified the effort by arguing that some countries, such as Cuba, refuse to accept deportees from the United States, leaving few alternatives for individuals whose immigration status has lapsed or been revoked.
The scale of the programme has grown quickly. Guyana is one of more than thirty nations that have now signed deals with the Trump administration to accept deportees who are not their own citizens. Several Caribbean states have joined in recent months. Others include St Kitts and Nevis, Belize and St Lucia, which was due to accept its first group this week. Some agreements have reportedly carried financial terms attached, though the details of individual arrangements are rarely disclosed in full.
The removals sit within a wider tightening of US immigration policy. The Trump administration has stripped tens of thousands of migrants of their legal status through the cancellation of programmes such as Temporary Protected Status and humanitarian parole, reducing the routes by which people already in the country can remain lawfully. Visa holders connected to pending asylum claims have also come under closer scrutiny.
Legal advocates have raised concerns about who is being sent under the scheme and why. Official assessments and independent monitoring point to the same pattern. The deportees sent had no criminal backgrounds, a detail that has drawn criticism from groups who argue the transfers are being used less as a law enforcement measure and more as a means of discouraging migrants from pursuing legitimate claims through the US courts. Human rights organisations have questioned these types of deportations, calling them contrary to international law and warning that some migrants end up being sent to countries close to those from which they fled due to persecution. Concerns specific to Afghan nationals have also surfaced. Amnesty International has called for an end to forced returns of Afghan refugees and asylum seekers, citing the risks they may face if eventually returned to Taliban rule.
For now, the six arrivals in Georgetown remain in a state of limbo rather than settlement. Those relocated to the country under the Assisted Voluntary Return Programme will await the outcome of their immigration cases in Guyana, with support delivered through the United Nations International Organisation for Migration. The Guyanese government has said it will not bear any housing or support costs itself. Depending on how their cases are resolved, the six could eventually return to Cuba or Afghanistan, or be relocated to a third country once again.
Guyana's government has framed its role as a limited and temporary act of cooperation rather than the start of a settlement programme. Officials in Georgetown have described the country's involvement as part of a collaborative migration framework allowing it to receive a limited, pre-approved number of deportees from other nations. Whether that framework expands beyond its current one-year term will depend on further negotiation between Washington and Georgetown, neither of which has indicated plans for a larger transfer in the near term.
