标签： Africa

MONROVIA, Liberia – In a major expansion of the Trump administration’s aggressive campaign to curb unauthorized migration into the United States, the West African nation of Liberia has formally agreed to take in up to 1,200 third-country deportees over the next 12 months, national officials confirmed in a press briefing Tuesday.

The first group of 20 deportees is scheduled to arrive in Liberia as early as this Thursday, according to Information Minister Jerolinmek Piah, who addressed reporters on the agreement. Unlike traditional deportation arrangements that send individuals back to their country of origin, this deal covers migrants from a broad range of regions, including other African nations, North America, South America and the Caribbean, Piah clarified.

This agreement is far from an isolated policy. The Trump administration has negotiated a number of comparable third-country deportation arrangements with other African nations in recent years. Immigration rights advocates estimate that thousands of migrants have already been sent by the U.S. to roughly 24 countries that are not the migrants’ home nations, as part of a sweeping, largely covert crackdown on unauthorized immigration.

One of the most contentious issues surrounding these deals centers on migrants who have already received formal protection orders from U.S. immigration judges. These orders prohibit sending the individuals back to their home countries due to documented risks to their personal safety, but there is no clear guarantee that third-party host nations will honor these protections. Piah declined to answer questions about whether any of the 1,200 deportees bound for Liberia hold such court-ordered protection.

Upon their arrival in Liberia, Piah said, deportees will have two primary options: they may choose to submit formal asylum applications to remain in the country, or they are free to depart for another destination at any time, with no restrictions placed on their movement by Liberian authorities.

Liberia will not be responsible for bearing the full costs of managing this deportation intake program, Piah added. The U.S. has committed to providing financial and logistical support to help Liberia process the arrivals and reinforce its national migration management infrastructure.

Framing the agreement as a reflection of the nation’s long-standing identity, Piah emphasized that Liberia’s decision to accept the deportees is rooted purely in humanitarian principle, aligned with the country’s historic traditions of offering safe haven to those in need.

In a major coordinated strike against an international drug trafficking ring, Nigerian law enforcement has taken into custody a high-profile social media influencer accused of serving as the Nigerian linchpin of a cartel moving large quantities of cocaine from South America to consumer markets in Europe and Asia. Officials with Nigeria’s National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) confirmed the arrest of 49-year-old Afolabi Kazeem Micheal, who built a public brand as ‘KC Luxury’ for his 700,000 Instagram followers, portraying himself as a legitimate dealer in gold and high-end luxury goods.

The investigation unfolded after authorities discovered 184.5 kilograms of cocaine concealed inside brown shipping boxes at a Lagos courier facility on August 3. NDLEA officials value the seized narcotics at approximately $28 million (£21 million), which was bound for final distribution in the United Kingdom. The seizure confirmed long-standing intelligence that the transnational network had used Nigeria as a key transit hub for moving cocaine to the UK, other European nations, and Asian markets for years, the agency said.

Ten days after the drug seizure, NDLEA operatives intercepted Micheal at Lagos’ Murtala Mohammed International Airport as he waited to board a business-class flight bound for Paris, France. Acting on verified intelligence that the suspect planned to flee the country to avoid prosecution, tactical teams apprehended him directly at the boarding gate, just moments before he would have escaped the jurisdiction of Nigerian law, NDLEA head General Buba Marwa told reporters.

When taken into custody, Micheal was found carrying more than $12,840 in cash held across three separate currencies (euros, British pounds, and Nigerian naira) along with a collection of high-value jewellery. NDLEA says these assets are consistent with proceeds generated by his alleged involvement in the illicit drug trade. A second suspect, 33-year-old Lawal Mujab Kehinde, was also taken into custody in connection with the plot. Kehinde, who is accused of working for the logistics firm used to transport the cocaine, allegedly handled packaging of the narcotics for export in exchange for cash payments. Neither Micheal nor Kehinde has issued a public response to the allegations, and neither has been formally charged in a Nigerian court as of the latest updates.

In addition to the two arrests in Nigeria, law enforcement counterparts in the UK have also taken multiple other suspected members of the same trafficking network into custody, according to NDLEA. The BBC has confirmed it is seeking official comment from UK authorities on the coordinated operation.

Marwa emphasized that the successful bust was a direct result of robust cross-border intelligence sharing and collaborative law enforcement work between international agencies. He issued a blunt warning to remaining members of the network still at large, stating that the NDLEA will not hesitate to track suspects to any location, including airport departure gates, to hold them accountable for their alleged criminal activities.

On Tuesday, a senior hospital official in Somalia confirmed that hours of intense combat between government forces and armed militias in the southwestern city of Baidoa has left a devastating trail of casualties, including at least four civilian deaths and 98 injured people.

The outbreak of violence began just after 5 a.m. local time on Monday, when coordinated attacks targeting government military outposts on Baidoa’s outskirts triggered full-scale fighting across the city. The urban area is currently a refuge for more than 500,000 people who have already been displaced by years of ongoing conflict and widespread drought across the Horn of Africa nation. Initial explosions rocked a military installation east of the city, followed immediately by heavy gun battles around a second base in the Bonkay neighborhood south of Baidoa. Armed fighters soon pushed into the city center, exchanging sustained fire with Somali government troops.

Regional security analyst Samira Gaid, who works with the Somali research firm Balqiis Insights, outlined the complicated dynamics of the assault. Fighters loyal to Abdiaziz Hassan Mohamed Laftagareen, the former president of Somalia’s South West state, managed to displace forces aligned with the new regional administration from parts of Baidoa for roughly six hours before being pushed out of the city. In a parallel set of attacks, fighters from al-Shabab, the al-Qaida-linked extremist organization that has waged an insurgency in Somalia for more than 15 years, assaulted two additional military positions on Baidoa’s outskirts. The coordinated timing of the two separate offensives has led Somali authorities to allege direct operational collaboration between Laftagareen’s militias and the extremist group, a claim that has not yet been independently verified.

Official casualty figures remain inconsistent, with no independent confirmation available to date. Somalia’s federal government says at least 30 attacking fighters were killed, while regional South West state authorities have reported a higher death toll of approximately 50 assailants killed. Neither side has released an official casualty count for government troops involved in the fighting. Dr. Abdikafi Omar Mohamud, head of the emergencies department at Baidoa’s Bay Regional Hospital, confirmed the civilian toll: four civilians killed, and 98 injured — among them 28 women and one elderly man who were struck by stray bullets during the urban combat.

The sudden influx of wounded patients has placed an overwhelming strain on Baidoa’s already fragile healthcare system, which was already struggling to serve both permanent residents and the massive population of displaced people encamped around the city. Baidoa sits roughly 245 kilometers (150 miles) northwest of Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu. Mohamud told reporters that his hospital only had 40 functional beds available when the fighting began, forcing staff to erect an emergency tent to accommodate the surge of wounded people. In addition to overcrowding, medical teams are also grappling with severe shortages of essential life-saving medicines, Mohamud added.

By Tuesday, calm had gradually returned to Baidoa. Security forces deployed to patrol major thoroughfares, conducting inspections of damaged buildings and vehicles that were caught in the crossfire. Local residents slowly began to emerge from their homes, where they had sheltered throughout the hours of fighting, though government troops maintained a heavy security presence across all key strategic areas of the city.

The latest eruption of violence is the direct result of months of simmering political tension over leadership of the South West state and its disputed electoral process. In March, Somalia’s federal government rejected Laftagareen’s contested indirect re-election to the regional presidency. Laftagareen, who had led South West state since 2018, announced his resignation after federal troops seized full control of Baidoa on March 30.

South West Internal Security Minister Isak Mohamed Korsaar reaffirmed the government’s claim of collaboration to reporters on Tuesday. “The militias that attacked us were not alone,” Korsaar said. “We have confirmed that they were accompanied by al-Shabab.” Korsaar added that government forces have recovered the bodies of slain al-Shabab fighters and taken multiple extremist fighters alive as captives.

Gaid, the regional security analyst, warned that the assault highlights a dangerous pattern that benefits extremist groups in Somalia: internal political disputes that devolve into armed conflict create open opportunities for al-Shabab to expand its influence and stage attacks. “When elite disputes are settled militarily, they create the conditions that the terrorist group exploits,” Gaid explained. “It is Somali civilians who pay for it.”

On the rugged North African coastline, where Morocco meets the Spanish exclave of Ceuta, a deadly wave of irregular migration unfolded last month, leaving dozens dead, countless families shattered, and exposing the deep-rooted drivers pushing people to risk everything for a chance at a better life in Europe. What began as viral misinformation spread across social media platforms snowballed into the deadliest migration crisis between the two nations in modern memory, with more than 70,000 aspiring migrants – from Morocco and beyond – flooding across the border breakwater by swimming or climbing over barriers.

Official data puts the confirmed death toll at at least 90, but human rights organizations argue the actual number of fatalities is far higher, and dozens of families still wait to recover the remains of their loved ones, trapped in bureaucratic limbo between Moroccan and Spanish authorities. Nearly all surviving migrants have been returned to Morocco, and both governments have since ramped up border security measures, placing blame on unregulated social media rumor-mongering and sophisticated human smuggling networks. But for the migrants who joined the surge, the choice was rooted in systemic economic despair: chronically high unemployment and stagnant low wages that leave even skilled workers unable to access basic needs or build stable futures.

The human cost of this crisis is etched into the stories of three men who did not return. Thirty-one-year-old Ayoub Akbili, a resident of Tangier just an hour from the border town of Fnideq, had never considered irregular migration before. A college graduate with a physics degree, he could not secure work in his field and was forced to take a job at a local auto parts factory, earning roughly $421 a month – slightly above Morocco’s national median salary. While Morocco’s macroeconomic outlook is relatively robust, with projected 4.5% growth this year driven by ambitions to become a regional automotive manufacturing hub, policymakers have failed to translate that growth into inclusive, well-paying jobs for young, educated workers.

It was while working his 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. shift that Akbili saw viral Facebook posts claiming the Ceuta border was open to new crossings. Desperate to earn enough to pay for his mother’s urgently needed hernia surgery, he made the split-second decision to go, persuading his roommate and relative Abdelhakim Saadaoui to join him. The pair paid $129 – equivalent to two months’ rent for a local apartment – for a driver to take them to the border perimeter. When they arrived, Saadaoui recalled, the scene was total chaos: crowds of people stretching as far as the eye could see, moving toward the frontier like a swarm of ants. Moroccan police deployed stun grenades and tear gas to disperse the crowd, and Saadaoui chose to turn back. Akbili pressed on.

The two stayed in contact by phone until Akbili suddenly stopped answering calls. A Moroccan Interior Ministry document obtained by the Associated Press confirms Akbili died just before midnight on July 31, his death classified as “unnatural” caused by severe head trauma after a fall from a cliff. He was buried quickly in his hometown of Khenifra, but his cousin Zakaria Akbili questions the official account, noting his cousin’s phone and wallet remained intact on his body – a detail he says contradicts the claim of a fatal cliff fall, and he is calling for a full independent investigation.

For 28-year-old Hamza Haibouri, a second-division professional soccer player with Morocco’s Kenitra Athletic Club, the draw of Europe was the chance to turn his athletic talent into a stable, successful career. Haibouri, who had visited France as a child and dreamed of returning to play at a higher level, was vacationing in the coastal town of Martil, 40 kilometers from Ceuta, when he saw the crowds heading for the border and decided to join. A deeply religious man who had played soccer professionally his whole adult life, he had not been able to secure a playing contract all year, and relied on the roughly $540 a month he had earned in previous seasons to get by. His club’s official fan club later announced his death during the crossing attempt.

The youngest victim, 19-year-old Abdelouahed Iken, was still finishing high school in the southern Moroccan city of Agadir when he saw glossy social media posts from a friend who had migrated to Italy, showing off a comfortable, prosperous life abroad. When rumors of an open border spread, Iken told his mother he was traveling to his home village, but instead journeyed more than 850 kilometers north to Ceuta with a group of friends. Unable to swim, he bought a cheap life jacket for the water crossing, but surviving friends told his family they watched him struggle in the currents before drowning. His family first learned of his death through a Facebook post, and are still fighting to bring his body home.

For many Moroccans, Europe remains a symbol of opportunity, stability, and upward mobility that feels out of reach at home. Migrants who successfully establish lives overseas often return with visible markers of success – designer clothing, new cars, European currency – making them objects of both admiration and envy for those who stay. The economic impact of migration is already significant: Moroccan government data shows remittances from overseas Moroccans hit $6.6 billion in the first half of this year alone, accounting for more than 3% of the country’s entire gross domestic product.

Yet for the families of those who died, the tragedy is compounded by bureaucratic gridlock and prohibitive costs to recover their loved ones’ remains. Family members report being asked to pay up to 2,500 euros in repatriation fees to bring bodies back from Ceuta, a sum far out of reach for most working-class Moroccan families. While the AP could not independently confirm the exact fee amount, repatriation requires multiple official documents: authorization from the Moroccan consulate, a transit permit from Spanish mortuary authorities, a sealed coffin, and a medical certificate confirming the death was not caused by a contagious disease.

A spokesperson for Ceuta’s regional government told the AP Friday that all required paperwork for repatriation has been completed, but Moroccan national authorities have not accepted the documents to allow transfer. The Moroccan government did not respond to multiple AP requests for comment on the delay, cost allocation, or potential government assistance for grieving families. Forensic officials in Ceuta have completed autopsies for all 82 migrants whose bodies were recovered on Spanish soil, but family members still face long waits and bureaucratic hurdles. Haibouri’s sister completed DNA testing to confirm his identity, and was only given his identification and driver’s license – authorities refused her request to see her brother’s body, and she has been told the repatriation process will take 20 days or more. “You can’t imagine the families’ suffering,” said Bilal Ratib, Haibouri’s childhood friend.

Morocco’s Trade Union Network for Migration has issued an urgent call for both governments to cover all repatriation costs and cut through red tape to return bodies to their families. Back in Tangier, Akbili’s roommate Saadaoui still struggles with the loss. He moved out of the apartment they shared, unable to bear living without his friend. “He was telling me at the border, ‘I will never come back,’” Saadaoui recalled. “And indeed, he will never come back.”