 HRW describes a system that makes protection increasingly precarious: people protected from deportation home can be sent to unfamiliar countries, detained there and pressured to return to the danger they escaped. Meanwhile, third-country agreements allow other asylum claims to be rejected without examining their merits. The report’s data also challenges the portrayal of these deportees as uniformly dangerous criminals: 

most people in its matched-flight sample had no recorded criminal history.

The strongest numbers, using the report’s printed page numbers:

 a protection order can prevent direct deportation home while leaving someone exposed to detention, coercion and onward removal elsewhere. HRW supports that conclusion with interviews and records, while acknowledging incomplete ICE data and the inability to match individual immigration-court orders to actual deportations.

Politics_And_Law

**Summary:** HRW describes a system that makes protection increasingly precarious: people protected from deportation home can be sent to unfamiliar countries, detained there and pressured to return to the danger they escaped. Meanwhile, third-country agreements allow other asylum claims to be rejected without examining their merits. The report’s data also challenges the portrayal of these deportees as uniformly dangerous criminals: **most people in its matched-flight sample had no recorded criminal history.**

The strongest numbers, using the report’s printed page numbers:

* **27,943 actual third-country deportations worldwide**, January 20, 2025–August 5, 2026, versus **8,563** in the equivalent comparison period, more than triple. Deportations to African third countries increased from **103 to 536**, more than fivefold. *(p. 126)*
* **46,563 third-country removal orders**, January 20, 2025–August 31, 2026,
a **963% increase** over the comparison period’s 4,382. These are court orders, **not completed deportations**. *(pp. 126–127)*
* **57.2% had no recorded criminal history:** 131 of the **229 people** HRW matched between reported African deportation flights and ICE records. Another **5.7% had pending charges**, and **37.1% had prior convictions**. This describes that sample, not all deportees. *(pp. 129–130)*
* **232 days was the median detention before removal** in that sample,
roughly eight months. The longest was **933 days**. Deportees ranged from **21 to 70 years old**; **25.8% were women**. *(p. 130)*
* **2,914 removal orders designated Uganda; 2,746 or 94%, followed motions that cut off asylum claims without examining their merits.** These figures cover January 20, 2025–July 31, 2026. *(pp. 92–93)*
* **At least 12 LGBT people were sent to African countries criminalizing same-sex relations or public same-sex romantic conduct**, including people already protected from return home because of persecution tied to their identity. *(p. 5)*
* **18 hours or longer in shackles**, according to interviewees. Accounts also described withheld destination information, inadequate food or water and denial of essential medication. *(pp. 1–2)*

**The central finding:** a protection order can prevent direct deportation home while leaving someone exposed to detention, coercion and onward removal elsewhere. HRW supports that conclusion with interviews and records, while acknowledging incomplete ICE data and the inability to match individual immigration-court orders to actual deportations.