After a plane journey in shackles, an Iranian woman found herself in the middle of Africa in a country she did not know existed. She is one of thousands of people deported from the US on the back of shadowy deals made with dozens of countries. Human rights lawyers describe these so-called third-country national arrangements as part of a “show of force” by the US, intended to discourage migrants and asylum seekers from entering.
People from Peru and Colombia have been sent to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. On 20 August, four Cubans, a Brazilian and a Cameroonian refused to disembark in Liberia, and were sent to Equatorial Guinea instead. The Guardian joined 23 other media organisations in the Deportation Project, a joint investigation coordinated by Forbidden Stories.
The consortium reviewed documents and interviewed more than 100 people on the US drive to extinguish unauthorised immigration. At what scale are third-country deportations happening? Since returning to office in 2025, Donald Trump’s administration has deported more than 25,000 people to countries that are not their own.
Which countries are people being deported to? The Trump administration has struck 35 deals allowing it to deport migrants and asylum seekers to countries where they often have no connections. A US federal appeals court ruled on Friday that the Trump administration’s third-country removals policy was unlawful.
A three-judge panel unanimously agreed that it violated due process. But the government has 90 days to appeal against the court’s decision, and is expected to do so. European intelligence officials have raised the possibility of an imminent Russian test of Nato, with one saying a potential attack could come in a matter of “months, not years”, the Guardian’s Shaun Walker reports.
The warnings come after Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, told parliament that intelligence assessments suggested Russia might launch an attack with drones or missiles on Nato territory in the coming months. The escalation fears come as the UN general assembly convenes in New York later this week, and amid intensifying airstrikes on both sides of Russia’s war on Ukraine. How imminent is the threat?
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