Congo to Receive Dozens of US Deportees Under New Deal

The Democratic Republic of Congo is set to receive more than 30 people deported from the United States, all of them nationals of other countries and some from Central and South America, in a move that underscores how far Washington is willing to stretch third-country deportation deals.

The first group is expected by Friday, and sources familiar with the arrangement gave different counts, with one putting the total at 37 and another at 45. The deportees are expected to be housed for 10 to 15 days in a hotel near Kinshasa’s main international airport before any further steps are taken.

The transfer comes just days after the U.S. and Congo announced a new arrangement, and it lands as the Trump administration tries to put weight behind two separate diplomatic tracks in central Africa. One is a U.S.-brokered peace agreement signed in Washington on June 27, 2025, between Congo and Rwanda, which called on the parties to respect sovereignty and territorial integrity, support negotiations with the M23/AFC under Qatar mediation, and work toward lasting peace and stability. The other is a strategic partnership signed on December 4, 2025, that says it is meant to facilitate stable, predictable, long-term access for U.S. persons and aligned persons to Congo’s critical minerals.

That overlap has sharpened scrutiny in Kinshasa and abroad. Human rights groups and opposition politicians in Congo have criticized the plan, while legal experts and rights advocates have questioned the basis for sending people to a country where they are not nationals. The Congolese government had not publicly commented by Tuesday, and the State Department said it had no comment on diplomatic communications with other governments.

Congo is only the latest African country to be drawn into the U.S. push for faster removals. Washington has already sent third-country deportees to Ghana, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and Eswatini, a practice that has triggered repeated legal and human rights disputes. In Ghana, at least 22 deportees were later returned to their home countries despite court-ordered protection in the United States. In Equatorial Guinea, at least three people were sent home under similar circumstances. In Eswatini, the Supreme Court ruled on April 10 that four men deported there by the United States could finally meet with a lawyer after nine months without in-person legal access.

The Congo deal now places immigration enforcement alongside diplomacy over minerals and regional security, showing the next phase of U.S. deportation policy is extending beyond borders and into countries with limited reintegration capacity and their own political strains.