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2025-01-28 16:36:00
Colombian President Gustavo Petro welcomes ‘free and dignified’ deportees, stressing that migrants are usually not criminals.
The primary flights carrying migrants deported from the USA to Colombia after a serious diplomatic row have arrived within the capital Bogota.
The Colombian authorities confirmed on Tuesday that two planes carrying migrants had landed. A complete of 201 migrants — 110 despatched from California and 90 from Texas — had been on board.
The flights mark an abrupt about-face for Colombia, which had rejected US navy planes bearing migrants over the weekend, arguing that their passengers shouldn’t be handled as criminals.
Some flights to Latin America reportedly carried migrants in handcuffs.
“The well-being of our fellow residents and the assure of their rights is a precedence of the Colombian authorities,” Colombia’s International Ministry mentioned in a social media publish on Tuesday.
The spat started on Sunday when Colombian President Gustavo Petro refused to authorise two deportation flights to land within the nation, angering his counterpart, US President Donald Trump.
The Trump administration responded by suspending the issuing of visas at Washington’s embassy in Bogota and imposing a journey ban on officers “who had been liable for the interference” with the deportation flights.
Trump, who has made cracking down on migration a prime precedence since returning to the White Home for a second time period on January 20, additionally threatened to impose 25 p.c tariffs on Colombian items. He mentioned that quantity would rise to 50 p.c in per week if Colombia endured in its stance.
Bogota initially struck a defiant tone, saying that it could impose its personal tariffs on the US.
However the two sides reached a deal to resolve the problem late on Sunday, which US officers hailed as a victory.
Colombian International Minister Luis Gilberto Murillo mentioned earlier this week that his nation would resume accepting deportees in “dignified circumstances” and use the presidential aircraft to assist deliver migrants again.
Bogota had been permitting Washington to ship deported Colombian residents again to their residence nation beneath earlier US administrations. However Petro’s authorities objected to how the deportees had been transported beneath Trump.
The left-wing Colombian president mentioned on Sunday that his nation by no means refused to just accept migrants.
“However don’t demand that I settle for deportees from the US, handcuffed and on navy plane,” Petro wrote in a social media publish. “We’re not anybody’s colony.”
On Tuesday, he shared pictures of one of many deportation flights — a Colombian air drive aircraft — that landed in Colombia.
“They’re Colombians. They’re free and dignified, and they’re of their homeland the place they’re liked,” Petro wrote.
“The migrant just isn’t a legal. He’s a human being who needs to work and progress, to dwell life.”
