WASHINGTON (US) – The Biden administration said on Saturday it was immediately suspending Trump-era asylum agreements with El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, as part of its attempts to reverse his Republican predecessor’s hardline immigration policies.
In a statement, State Department Secretary Antony Blinken said the United States had “suspended and initiated the process to terminate the Asylum Cooperative Agreements with the Governments of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras as the first concrete steps on the path to greater partnership and collaboration in the region laid out by President Biden.”
The so-called “safe third country” agreements, formed in 2019 by the Trump administration and the Central American nations, has forced asylum seekers from the region to first request refuge in those countries before they set out to apply in the United States.
The State Department said on Saturday that part of a controversial bid by Trump to level a crack down on illegal immigrants from Central America who account for a large part of migrants, who were taken control of at the US-Mexico border, the policies were never implemented with El Salvador and Honduras.
The statement added that transfers under the US-Guatemala agreement have been suspended since mid-March 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The moves announced Saturday was post the unveiling of a host of measures last week by Biden administration, aimed at revamping the US immigration system, which includes a task force to have families separated at the United States-Mexico border reunited and another to increase an annual cap on refugees.
One of the orders called for Blinken to “promptly consider” whether to intimate the governments of the three countries that the United States’ intention was to suspend and terminate the safe third country deals. It also called on the Secretary of Homeland Security and the Attorney General to decide whether to annul a rule implementing the agreements.