![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/usa-iraq-refugees-africa-rwanda.png\")
<\/a>Screenshot of diplomatic cable<\/p><\/div>\n
22 Apr 2025\u00a0<\/em>– A US State Department cable was sent from the American Embassy in Kigali, Rwanda, on March 13th with some major news: Rwanda said it was willing to accept deportees from the United States who are unable to be sent to their country of origin for fear of persecution. A copy of the cable reviewed by The Handbasket<\/i> in March confirmed the news. And now according to a new cable, which has also been reviewed by The Handbasket<\/i>, the first person has officially been deported from the US to Rwanda via this new arrangement.<\/p>\n The Trump administration\u2019s efforts to deport as many people as possible is loudly and publicly underway, most notably with the 238 men who were sent to El Salvador in March without due process. Unlike those cases, however, the administration has opted to quietly send Iraqi national Omar Abdulsattar Ameen from the US to Rwanda, wherein Rwanda acts as a \u201cthird country.\u201d But it remains unclear what legal processes allowed for this to happen.<\/p>\n The cable, sent today\u2014April 22, 2025\u2014confirms Ameen\u2019s \u201crelocation\u201d has already happened. (Note: Excerpts from the cable refer to the Iraqi National as \u201cAmen\u201d except in one place where he is called \u201cAmeen.\u201d Earlier court documents<\/a> and media reports<\/a> refer to him as \u201cAmeen\u201d, so that is what I\u2019ll be using):<\/p>\n \u201cEmbassy Kigali convened an after-action exercise that confirmed the U.S. interagency effectively supported a capable Rwandan government to relocate detained Iraqi national Mr. Omar Abdulsattar Ameen, who could not be removed to Iraq pursuant to U.S immigration proceedings. This successful relocation – and Rwanda’s subsequent agreement to accept additional third-country nationals (TCNs) – proved the concept for developing a new removal program to relocate TCNs from the United States to Rwanda.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The cable references a \u201cwish list\u201d of policy concessions provided by Rwanda and a request for \u201ca one-time payment of $100,000 to support social services, residency documents, and work permits.\u201d (A related note sent out today and reviewed by The Handbasket<\/i> confirms the payment was made, but makes no further references to the wish list.) \u201cRwanda also agreed to accept another ten TCNs of various nationalities,\u201d the cable states, adding the country \u201cseeks a bilateral dialogue to develop a durable program to facilitate these relocations and avoid reinventing the wheel with time-intensive ad hoc negotiations.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cRwanda’s primary motivation for accepting Mr. Amen and subsequent TCNs [Third Country Nationals] is to improve U.S. relations and show it can advance the America First agenda,\u201d the US embassy cable reads.<\/p>\n There\u2019s also a section of the cable called \u201cpress posture\u201d that outlines how all parties involved should approach external questions about Ameen\u2019s relocation. It includes these three bullets:<\/p>\n So far neither party has made a public statement about the relocation.<\/p>\n The selection of Ameen as the first person to test this arrangement doesn\u2019t seem coincidental. He was a target of deportation by the first Trump administration, which attempted to smear him<\/a> as a \u201cterrorist\u201d and \u201cmember of ISIS\u201d who had abused the refugee resettlement program to gain entry to the US. Ameen and his family were granted US refugee status in 2014: It wasn\u2019t until August 2018, when the Trump administration was well underway, that \u201cdozens of armed men\u201d showed up at his Sacramento home to detain him.<\/p>\n Ameen was accused of murdering a police officer in Iraq as part of an ISIS plot, and the Trump administration was seeking to extradite him back to Iraq where he would stand trial for the alleged crime. His case was profiled in a 2020 issue of the New Yorker<\/a> under the headline, \u201cThe Fight to Save an Innocent Refugee from Almost Certain Death.\u201d<\/p>\n Ameen maintained throughout that he and his family were in Turkey at the time of the murder. Federal Judge Edmund F. Brennan ruled in 2021 that the Justice Department\u2019s case was \u201cdubious\u201d, with \u201cunreliable\u201d witnesses and allegations that were \u201csimply not plausible,\u201d and ordered his immediate release. Once released however, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)\u2014under President Biden\u2019s control\u2014picked him up immediately and began deportation proceedings. They claimed he did not disclose ties to a terrorist organization on his refugee application and has remained in ICE custody ever since.<\/p>\n On May 13th of last year, his legal team at Immigrant Legal Defense<\/a> published a post on their website calling once again for Ameen\u2019s release. They quoted a letter from the Sacramento Mayor and City Council members, stating: \u201cWe urge the immediate release of Mr. Ameen and an end to his deportation proceedings. Not only is there no basis for his continued detention or deportation, the false accusations against Mr. Ameen would place him in danger of wrongful execution were he returned to Iraq.\u201d<\/p>\n In a statement from Ameen himself, he wrote at the time: \u201cI am so grateful to the judge for listening to all the evidence, and I thank God that in this country, I had the right to defend myself and be found innocent. I love America and want to enjoy living here with my wife and children for the rest of my life. It saddens me that I still have to fight for my freedom again. Please let me go home to my family now so that I can enjoy these last few days of Ramadan with them, break my fast with them, and enjoy my first Eid with my children in over two years.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite all this, Ameen became a resident of Rwanda on April 4th as a result of State Department maneuvering.<\/p>\n It\u2019s worth noting that the idea of using Rwanda as a third country is not new. In 2022, the UK government under Prime Minister Rishi Sunak attempted a similar arrangement, passing a bill that would allow them to send migrants on a one-way trip to Rwanda. The purpose was to deter people from making risky crossings across the English Channel, and Sunak promised to \u201cstop the boats.\u201d But the bill became mired in litigation, going all the way up to Britain\u2019s Supreme Court<\/a>, which ruled Rwanda was not a safe country for which to send asylum seekers.<\/p>\n \u201cThe judges said there was evidence Rwanda had a culture that misunderstood its obligations under the Refugee Convention, was dismissive toward asylum-seekers<\/a> from the Middle East and Afghanistan, and had little experience of the asylum procedures needed to handle the cases of migrants from around the world,\u201d The AP reported<\/a> in April 2024. When the Labour Party\u2019s Keir Starmer took over as Prime Minister in July, he declared the Rwanda scheme “dead and buried”<\/a> on his first day in office.<\/p>\n It\u2019s unclear if this new US arrangement with Rwanda is part of the Trump administration\u2019s larger mass deportation project, or limited to more targeted cases. But the fact that a person in US custody can be quietly sent to another country\u2014a country to which they\u2019ve never been\u2014is certainly newsworthy.<\/p>\n ____________________________________<\/p>\n Marisa Kabas is a Brooklyn-based independent journalist and founder of The Handbasket<\/a>\u2014a bold newsletter born from journalism\u2019s decline, now her full-time pursuit. From exposing George Santos\u2019 lies \u00a0to chronicling Trump\u2019s erosion of democracy, she breaks scoops with relentless grit.<\/em><\/p>\n\n