‘Unconscionable’: US sends dozens to Haiti on deportation flight

Deportations ‘could be a death sentence’, advocates say, as gang violence and instability grip the Caribbean country.

The United States has sent dozens of Haitian citizens back to their country on a deportation flight, despite a surge in deadly gang violence and widespread instability in the Caribbean nation.

A spokesperson for the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told Al Jazeera on Thursday that one of its agencies — Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — “conducted a repatriation flight of around 50 Haitian nationals to Haiti”.

“Individuals are removed only if they were found to not have a legal basis to remain in the United States,” the spokesperson said in an email.

The brief statement did not say where in the US the flight took off from, or where it was scheduled to land in Haiti. Al Jazeera has requested further clarification.