Three flights, carrying a total of 299 migrants, including children as young as 5, landed in Panama in mid-February. For the following three weeks, amid an international outcry over what critics described as a stunning breach of U.S. and international law, the migrants who had not committed any crimes were held against their will. As public pressure on Panama mounted and immigrant advocates filed suit against that country, authorities there released the migrants over the weekend, on the condition that they agree to make their own arrangements to leave within 90 days.

Their release has hardly settled matters, however, among those groups that consider themselves part of the international safety net charged with providing migrants humanitarian support. Among them is the International Organization for Migration, which helped Panama return migrants who chose to go home rather than remain in detention. The IOM said it participated in the effort because it believes that without its presence the situation for migrants would be “far worse.” Critics charge that the group’s role shows how much the safety net relies on the United States and as a result can easily come undone.

“I appreciate that some individuals hold the view that providing a more humane detention and deportation or voluntary return is better than a less humane version of those unequivocal rights violations,” said Hannah Flamm, an attorney with the International Refugee Assistance Project, a legal advocacy group in New York. “But in the context of egregious unlawful conduct by the Trump administration, this is a moment that calls for deep introspection on where the line of complicity lies.”

She added, “If everybody abided by their legal and ethical obligations not to violate the rights of people seeking protection in the U.S., these third-country removals could not happen.”

Bolding and italics added, archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20250317110833/https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-deportations-panama-asylum-aid-groups