Burkina Faso will not accept immigrants who have been deported from the United States

Burkina Faso has stated that it has turned down a U.S. proposal to host foreigners who are being deported as part of the immigration crackdown under President Donald Trump.

Millions of illegal immigrants are targeted for deportation by Trump, and his government has attempted to increase removals to third nations, particularly many in Africa.

The government of Ghana, Burkina Faso’s neighbor, announced in September that it has decided to accept citizens from other West African nations.

But on Thursday night, Burkina Faso’s Foreign Minister Karamoko Jean-Marie Traore told a national station that Ouagadougou had turned down several attempts by the Trump administration to take in deportees from outside the country.

Saying that “Burkina Faso is not a land of deportation,” Traore referred to the U.S. proposal as indecent and dishonorable.

He added Burkina Faso’s hospitality “should not be seen as an opportunity for a third country to get rid of certain populations that it considers undesirable,” pointing out that the government recently opted to waive visa fees for all Africans.

Following two coups in 2022, Ibrahim Traore headed Burkina Faso’s military-led government. As the junta’s links to Russia have deepened, tensions have increased between the nation’s government and Western nations.

Starting on Friday, the U.S. Embassy in Ouagadougou temporarily suspended all regular visa services and instructed locals to contact the embassy in Lome, the capital of Togo. They didn’t explain.

An inquiry about whether the United States has attempted to send third-country deportees to Burkina Faso was not immediately answered by the U.S. State Department.

If Burkina Faso had accepted the idea, Traore did not specify what it may have gotten.

The decision to accept West African deportees was not seen by Ghana as a support of Trump’s immigration policies, and the country was not receiving any benefits in exchange.