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Guatemala Gives Rubio Second Deal 02/06 06:21
GUATEMALA CITY (AP) -- Guatemalan President Bernardo Arvalo said Wednesday
his country will accept migrants from other countries who are being deported
from the United States, the second deportation deal that Secretary of State
Marco Rubio has reached during a Central America trip that has been focused
mainly on immigration.
Under the agreement announced by Arvalo, the deportees would be returned to
their home countries at U.S. expense.
"We have agreed to increase by 40% the number of flights of deportees both
of our nationality as well as deportees from other nationalities," Arvalo said
at a news conference with Rubio.
Previously, including under the Biden administration, Guatemala had been
accepting on average seven to eight flights of its citizens from the U.S. per
week. Under President Donald Trump it's also been one of the countries that
have had migrants returned on U.S. military planes.
El Salvador announced a similar but broader agreement on Monday. Salvadoran
President Nayib Bukele said his country would accept U.S. deportees of any
nationality, including American citizens and legal residents who are imprisoned
for violent crimes.
Both Trump and Rubio acknowledged the legal uncertainty of sending Americans
to another country for imprisonment.
"I'm just saying if we had a legal right to do it, I would do it in a
heartbeat," Trump told reporters Tuesday in the Oval Office. "I don't know if
we do or not, we're looking at that right now."
Rubio called it a very generous offer but said there were "obviously
legalities involved. We have a Constitution."
Immigration, a Trump administration priority, has been the major focus of
Rubio's first foreign trip as America's top diplomat, a five-country tour
spanning Panama, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic.
The agreements with El Salvador and Guatemala potentially help the Trump
administration address what has always been a key sticking point in immigration
enforcement since not everyone in the U.S. illegally can be easily sent back
home.
Venezuela, for example, has been a major source of migrants coming to the
U.S. in recent years, but rarely can the U.S. deport Venezuelans back to their
home country. But the U.S. already has a robust network set up to send people
to several Central American countries.
Guatemala will expand its capacity to receive not just Guatemalans, but also
migrants from other countries who will then be repatriated to their home
countries. The details still need to be worked out.
"However, the permanent answer to immigration is to bring development so
that no one has to leave the country," Arvalo said. To that end, a high-level
Guatemalan delegation, including from the private sector, will travel to
Washington in the coming weeks.
Arvalo also announced the formation of a new border security force that
will patrol Guatemala's borders with Honduras and El Salvador. The force will
be made up of police and soldiers and will combat transnational crime of all
kinds, he said.
Rubio's trip has been dogged by the administration's dismantling of the U.S.
Agency for International Development, including a late Tuesday order abruptly
pulling almost all agency staffers off the job.
After the news conference with Guatemala's president, Rubio headed directly
to the U.S. Embassy, where staffers and their families who were unsure of their
futures gathered to hear from their new boss.
The meet-and-greet event was closed to the press, as was an earlier similar
event in El Salvador. Both Guatemala and El Salvador have significant USAID
missions. In Panama on Sunday before the shut down announcement, Rubio's
embassy event had been open to journalists.
From there Rubio wrapped up his Guatemala stop by visiting a local migration
facility near an air force base where deportees are processed for integration
back into their home communities. Under the measures announced Wednesday by
Guatemala's president, the number of deportees is expected to rise by as much
as 40%. The program has been supported by the U.S. State Department and
Department of Homeland Security.
Rubio also got a briefing on Guatemala's counternarcotics efforts, including
the interception of at least four shipments of fentanyl precursors since late
November totaling 127.5 kilograms (280 pounds), enough to produce more than 114
million doses of the drug.
Rubio, who has offered exemptions to Trump's sweeping freeze on foreign
assistance, has signed waivers to allow funding for both programs to continue,
officials said.
"This is an example of foreign aid that's in our national interest. That's
why I've issued a waiver for these programs. That's why these programs are
coming back online. And they will be functioning because it's a way of showing
to the American people this is the kind of foreign aid that's aligned with our
foreign policy, with our national interest," Rubio said.
Rubio also spoke Wednesday with Mexican Foreign Secretary Juan Ramn de la
Fuente to discuss ways to secure the U.S.-Mexico border, fight fentanyl and
transnational criminal organizations and end illegal immigration, according to
a State Department statement.
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