Maiquetía (Venezuela) (AFP) – A group of migrants will be repatriated to Venezuela after they were deported from the United States and sent to a prison in El Salvador, a source close to the operation said Friday. “The flight is coming from El Salvador, from CECOT,” the source told AFP on condition of anonymity, referring to the high-security jail where the migrants were held under a deal with US President Donald Trump’s administration.
Venezuelan authorities did not immediately provide details about the repatriation, including the number of migrants involved. More than 250 Venezuelans were expelled by the Trump administration to El Salvador after being accused of belonging to the Tren de Aragua criminal gang, a charge that their families and lawyers deny. Washington agreed to pay President Nayib Bukele’s administration millions of dollars to hold the migrants in CECOT, which was built by Bukele to house gang members.
“I can’t contain my happiness,” Mercedes Yamarte, mother of Mervin Yamarte, one of the deportees detained in El Salvador, told AFP. Earlier Friday, another group of Venezuelans, including seven children separated from their parents, arrived at Maiquetia International Airport that serves Caracas after being repatriated from the United States, the government said.
© 2024 AFP
