Deported 192 migrants return to Venezuela 

A  flight carrying 192 Venezuelan migrants deported from the US arrived at the Simon Bolivar International Airport in Maiquetia, which serves the capital Caracas area, the Ministry of Interior, Justice and Peace of Venezuela reported. The flight, operated by a US-registered aircraft, carried 156 men, 26 women, and 10 minors. The returned migrants were attended to under established medical, legal, and social protocols. Since February, Venezuela has been receiving 2-3 flights per week of indivi­duals deported by US.

Washington: Mistakenly deported Salvadoran native Kilmar Abrego Garcia appeared in a Tennessee courtroom on Friday, hours after he was brought back to the United States to face criminal charges for allegedly transporting undocumented migrants within the US, ABC News reported.

Over two months after the Trump administration admi­tted it mistakenly deported Abrego Garcia from Maryland to native El Salvador, a 2-count indictment unsealed on Friday alleges he took part in a yearslong conspiracy to haul undocumented migrants from Texas to the country.

The return of Abrego Garcia from his native El Salvador follows court battles in which the administration repeatedly said it was unable to bring him back, drawing the country toward the brink of a constitutional crisis when the administration failed to heed the Supreme Court’s order to facilitate his return.

He made his initial court appearance on Friday evening in Tennessee, answering “Yes, I understand” in Spanish when US Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes asked him if he understood the charges. 

Judge Homes set a hearing for June 13, where Abrego Garcia will be arraigned on charges and the judge will take up the government’s motion to hold him in pre-trial detention on the grounds that he “poses a danger to the community and a serious risk of flight”. He will remain in federal custody in Tennessee pending next week’s hearing.

“If convicted, the defendant faces a punishment of 10 years’ imprisonment for ‘each alien’ he transported,” said the government’s motion for detention, which also contained an allegation— not included in the indictment — that one of Abrego Garcia’s co-conspirators told authorities that Abrego Garcia participated in the murder of a rival gang member’s mother in El Salvador. Abrego Garcia’s attorney called the charges “an abuse of power”.