ICE official details risks for staff and detainees in Djibouti, including malaria and potential rocket attacks
CBSN
A top Immigration and Customs Enforcement official on Thursday detailed what she said were deplorable and unsafe conditions faced by ICE staff and a group of migrants with criminal records who were transferred to a U.S. military base in the African country of Djibouti after a federal judge blocked officials from deporting them to South Sudan.
Melissa Harper, the No. 2 official in the ICE division responsible for deportations, revealed in a sworn declaration in federal court in Massachusetts that the detainees are being held in a shipping container repurposed as a conference room inside Camp Lemonnier, a U.S. Navy installation. Eight migrant detainees from Asia, Latin America and South Sudan who had been convicted of serious crimes in the U.S. were flown to the base last month after a judge said they could not be sent to South Sudan without being given a chance to contest their deportation.
Harper outlined a series of concerns about the arrangement, describing inadequate security equipment, illness among government employees and 100-degree outdoor temperatures. She detailed risks from exposure to malaria, nearby burn pits and potential attacks from terrorists in Yemen, presumably the Houthis.
