U.S. deporting African and Asian migrants to Panama in diplomatic breakthrough

Washington — The U.S. is deporting unauthorized migrants from nations in Africa and Asia to Panama, a major diplomatic breakthrough for the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts, internal federal documents obtained by CBS News show.

The ministry said Wednesday’s deportation flight included 119 deportees from Afghanistan, China, India, Iran, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Turkey, Uzbekistan and Vietnam. The costs of the deportations under the agreement will be covered by the U.S., the ministry added.

The U.S. has long had difficulty deporting migrants from Africa and Asia, due to the long distances involved in deportations to the Eastern Hemisphere and decisions by governments in those continents to limit or reject American deportations flights.

The flights also underscore how aggressively and quickly the Trump administration is moving to convince countries across the region to accept migrants who are difficult to deport, even though they are not citizens of their nations.

The governments of El Salvador and Guatemala have already agreed to accept migrant deportees from the U.S. who are not from their countries. El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele has even offered to accept and detain suspected members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua who are expelled from the U.S.

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