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Donald Trump’s administration has deported at least two Asian nationals to war-torn South Sudan in defiance of a court order blocking their removal, according to court documents.
On Monday night, two immigrants from Myanmar and Vietnam held in federal custody were abruptly notified that they would be deported to the African nation, which the State Department reports is plagued by slavery, kidnapping, sexual abuse, torture and extrajudicial killings.
By Tuesday morning, the men were already on a plane with at least 10 other immigrants, according to their lawyers.
Attorneys have filed an emergency request to a federal judge in Boston to order their “immediate” return to the United States. District Judge Brian Murphy previously blocked the government from deporting people to so-called “third-party countries,” and he has already intervened to stop the administration from deporting people to Libya, another African nation in the grips of a humanitarian crisis.
Earlier this month, Murphy ruled that any removals to Libya would “clearly violate” his court order.
The Burmese man identified in court documents as N.M. was initially scheduled to board one of those flights to Libya, according to his attorney.
Their removal to South Sudan “blatantly defies” the judge’s order, attorneys wrote.
A hearing in the case is scheduled for 1 p.m. May 21.
The removal of immigrants from the United States to another foreign country would mark a significant escalation of the administration’s aggressive anti-immigration platform, which already has sent several planes to Latin American countries, including El Salvador, where dozens of deportees are imprisoned in a notorious jail condemned by human rights groups.
South Sudan, the world’s youngest country, has experienced waves of violence and political instability since gaining independence from Sudan in 2011. Civil war broke out in December 2013, resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths.
A peace agreement in 2018 ended the war and established a unity government, but the arrest of a vice president and opposition leader — compounded by military clashes with civilians — has created a rapidly deteriorating crisis, according to United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
Current conditions are “darkly reminiscent” of the civil wars that killed more than 400,000 people, he said in March.
Last month, the head of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan warned that a standoff between forces loyal to the president and vice president have “degenerated into direct military confrontation and escalated tensions across the country.”
“Another war is a risk South Sudan simply cannot afford, and nor can the wider region,” Nicholas Haysom told the U.N.’s security council.
English (US) ·