U.S. Deports Afghans, Iranians to Central African Republic Under Third-Country Removal Agreements
The United States on Saturday deported dozens of people to the Central African Republic, including an Afghan man whose brothers collaborated with the U.S. military and who had been granted protection against removal to Afghanistan by a U.S. judge, according to his lawyer and an advocacy group (NPR).
The deportation flight landed in Bangui, the Central African Republic's capital, on August 30, 2026. Savi Arvey, director of policy, refugee and immigrant rights at Human Rights First, said the manifest included 12 Afghans and eight Iranians, along with several people from Nepal and Nicaragua. The flight was the second such deportation to the Central African Republic since June; an earlier flight carried two dozen migrants, among them an Iranian woman facing persecution in her home country.
The Afghan man, in his early twenties, had been granted withholding of removal to Afghanistan by a U.S. judge due to fears of persecution by the Taliban, according to his lawyer, Alma David. Under U.S. law, withholding of removal prohibits the government from sending a noncitizen to a country where their life or freedom would be threatened on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion (Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals).
Court documents seen by The Associated Press show the man's family in Afghanistan had received threats from the Taliban because of work performed by his brothers in support of the U.S. military. One brother, who lives in the United States, served in the Afghan National Army, which collaborated with American forces before the Taliban seized power in 2021. Another brother, a pilot trained by the United States, was killed by the Taliban.
The Afghan Allies Protection Act provides special immigrant visas for Afghan nationals who worked with or on behalf of the U.S. government (DHS). The deported man's case, however, rested on derivative exposure to Taliban retaliation tied to his brothers' service rather than his own direct employment with the U.S. government.
Under a series of often secret agreements, the Trump administration has deported thousands of people to roughly two dozen countries that are not their own as part of its immigration crackdown, according to advocates. The Central African Republic is among the receiving countries. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has previously carried out removals of individuals with terrorism-related ties to their countries of citizenship, including a Somali-born Canadian national with close ties to al-Qaeda (ICE) and a British national sentenced in federal court for supporting terrorism fundraising (ICE). Those cases, however, involved removal to the individuals' countries of nationality rather than third-country transfers.
The broader context here is the tension between third-country removal and judicially granted withholding of removal. Withholding of removal is a distinct form of protection from asylum; it is mandatory when an immigration judge finds a clear probability of persecution on a protected ground, and it carries no path to lawful permanent residency. What Saturday's flight illustrates is the administration's use of third-country agreements to deport individuals to nations other than the one from which they received protection, effectively sidestepping the country-specific bar without directly violating the withholding order.
For practitioners, the key question is whether the receiving third country, in this case the Central African Republic, presents its own risk of persecution on a protected ground, which could raise a separate legal barrier to removal. The Department of Justice has recognized Afghanistan claim types that include fear of harm by the Taliban based on political opinion and religion (DOJ). Whether that analysis extends to the conditions a deportee faces upon arrival in a third country remains an open legal question.
Saturday's flight also underscores the operational opacity of the third-country removal program. The agreements themselves are frequently secret, and the composition of the flight manifests has been made public through advocacy groups rather than government disclosure. Human Rights First identified the nationalities on the Bangui flight; ICE and the Department of Homeland Security have not published a corresponding release.
For the Afghan man specifically, the protection he received from a U.S. judge barred his removal to Afghanistan. It did not, on its face, bar his removal to a third country. How the government selected the Central African Republic as the destination, and what assessment, if any, was conducted regarding the conditions he would face there, is not clear from the available record. His lawyer and the advocacy group tracking the flight have not indicated what legal challenges, if any, remain available.
The second flight to Bangui in three months suggests the Central African Republic is now an active destination in the administration's third-country removal framework, alongside the two dozen other nations identified by advocates. The June precedent, carrying an Iranian woman who faced persecution in Iran, established the route. Saturday's flight, with its larger manifest and the inclusion of an Afghan man whose family directly assisted U.S. military operations, tests the boundaries of judicially ordered protection in a new way.
