{"id":405171,"date":"2026-04-18T13:28:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-18T13:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/405171\/"},"modified":"2026-04-18T13:28:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T13:28:08","slug":"trump-administration-deports-elderly-irishman-from-us-to-costa-rica-under-controversial-deal-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/405171\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump administration deports elderly Irishman from US to Costa Rica under controversial deal \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Trump administration<\/a> has deported an elderly Irishman to Costa Rica<\/a> as part of a controversial agreement between the two countries.<\/p>\n

The man arrived in the central American country on Friday as part of a group of 22 deportees.<\/p>\n

Since Donald Trump<\/a> returned to the US presidency last year, the country has dramatically stepped up deportations<\/a>, including of Irish nationals.<\/p>\n

Deportations of Irish people by US authorities increased from 15 in 2024 to 65 last year.<\/p>\n

To speed up the process, Washington is increasingly sending deportees to countries where they have no connections. Shannon Airport in Co Clare is frequently used as a refuelling stop by aircraft involved in these operations.<\/p>\n

According to Costa Rica\u2019s General Directorate of Migration and Foreigners (DGME), the Irish man arrived in the country along with eight Brazilians, three Romanians, three Uzbets, two Chinese, two Azerbaijanis, one Indian, one Belarusian and one Vietnamese.<\/p>\n

The DGME described the Irish man as \u201celderly\u201d and said one of the Romanian deportees was a minor.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce their immigration control is completed, they are given primary care which consists of explaining the process to them through translators, and together with the Red Cross, verifying that they are in good health,\u201d said the DGME in a statement issued in Spanish.<\/p>\n

The Irish man will be offered assistance to return to Ireland under a programme managed by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), authorities said. He may also apply to remain in Costa Rica on humanitarian grounds.<\/p>\n

It is the second group of foreign nationals to be deported to country by the US under a deal signed by Costa Rica\u2019s president Rodrigo Chaves last month. <\/p>\n

The arrangement, which has been strongly criticised by human rights groups, will see up to 25 people deported from the US to Costa Rica every week.<\/p>\n

The Department of Foreign Affairs in Ireland has been asked for comment.<\/p>\n

Separately, the US is continuing to use Shannon Airport to facilitate its deportation operations.<\/p>\n

On Thursday a small US aircraft operated by Journey Air and leased to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) landed in Shannon to refuel while deporting migrants to Nairobi in Kenya.<\/p>\n

It is due to stop in Shannon again on Saturday afternoon on the return leg.<\/p>\n

This week, Amnesty International and Human Rights First sent a joint letter to the Irish Government calling on it to end the \u201cuse of Shannon Airport as a refuelling stopover for unlawful removal flights by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement\u201d.<\/p>\n

Shannon has been used six times for such operations<\/a> since Trump returned to office.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese operations took people to South Sudan, Eswatini, Rwanda and Israel, and have included third-country removals where individuals are forcibly taken to countries where they have no connection,\u201d Human Rights First said.<\/p>\n

The groups accused the US government of flouting international law and \u201ccutting deals with dictators\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Irish Government decides how its sovereign airspace and territory is used by other states,\u201d said Stephen Bowen, executive director of Amnesty International Ireland<\/p>\n

\u201cIt must play no role whatsoever in the United States\u2019 inhuman, cruel and extreme mass immigration detention and removal machine.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Trump administration has deported an elderly Irishman to Costa Rica as part of a controversial agreement between…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":405172,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59755,42,1629,43,40,38,41,39,20966,115],"class_list":{"0":"post-405171","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-costa-rica","9":"tag-headlines","10":"tag-immigration","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-top-news","13":"tag-top-stories","14":"tag-topnews","15":"tag-topstories","16":"tag-trump-presidency","17":"tag-united-states"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=405171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405171\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/405172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=405171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=405171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=405171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}