Afghan Family Helps U.S. Military; U.S. Sends A Relative To Central Africa

WASHINGTON—The United States deported an Afghan man in his early twenties to the Central African Republic on Saturday after an immigration judge barred his return to Afghanistan because the Taliban could persecute him.

His family’s danger came with an American connection. One brother served in the Afghan National Army alongside U.S. forces and now lives in the United States. Another was a U.S.-trained pilot killed by the Taliban. Court records reviewed by The Associated Press said the family received Taliban threats because of the brothers’ work supporting the American military.

Protection from Afghanistan did not amount to permission to remain in America. The administration instead placed him on a flight to Bangui with 12 Afghans, eight Iranians and people from Nepal and Nicaragua. The law’s promise was observed precisely: he was not sent to the country where a judge found he faced persecution. He was merely sent somewhere else that was not his country.

The administration has used agreements, many of them secret, to send thousands of deportees to roughly two dozen third countries. Lawyers say the practice can become a route for indirectly returning asylum seekers to places they fled. Saturday’s flight was the second to the Central African Republic since June.

The family helped the United States during a war that ended five years ago. America has now demonstrated that its memory is long enough to document their service, assess the resulting threat and print a boarding pass in the opposite direction.