Beldangi refugee camp, Nepal
CNN
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More than two dozen refugees from Bhutan have been left in a unique legal limbo after they were deported by the US back to the tiny Himalayan nation they once fled – only for it to reject them a second time.
The refugees are Lhotshampa, a Nepali-speaking ethnic minority who were expelled from Bhutan in the 1990s. After decades in refugee camps in eastern Nepal, more than 100,000 of them were legally resettled in the US, Australia, Canada and other countries under a UN-led program that began in 2007.
Until very recently, the US had not deported a single person to Bhutan in years, according to data from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), because the Bhutanese government was unwilling to repatriate its refugees, who were stripped of their citizenship when they fled.
But since March, more than two dozen Lhotshampa have been deported from the US back to Bhutan – though the country is still refusing to take them in, according to several deportees, advocates and the Nepali government. Many have ended up back in the same Nepal refugee camps where as children they dreamed of a better life abroad.
Ramesh Sanyasi, 24, was born in a refugee camp and migrated to the US when he was 10 years old with his parents and older sister. Sanyasi was living in Pennsylvania, a hub for refugees from Bhutan, and working in an Amazon warehouse until last year, when he said he was arrested while borrowing his friend’s car during a night out.
Sanyasi was convicted of unauthorized use of a motor vehicle and handing false ID to law enforcement, court records show. In April of this year, after spending eight months in jail, Sanyasi said he was put on a one-way flight to New Delhi, India, then to Paro, Bhutan.
When he arrived in Bhutan, he said, local authorities took him and two other refugees to the border with India, where they paid someone to take the men to Panitanki, a town on the India-Nepal border, giving the deportees 30,000 Indian rupees (about $350) each.
Sanyasi said he and the other deportees paid someone to smuggle them across the Mechi River into Nepal.
“Life here is tough. I’m living without any identification documents, which makes everything challenging. I can’t even withdraw money sent by relatives because I lack proper ID,” Sanyasi told CNN in an interview from Beldangi refugee camp, where he is now staying.
“My days are spent idly, with no clear purpose or direction,” Sanyasi said. “For now, I’m surviving on money sent from the US, but once that runs out, I don’t know what will happen.” His sister, mother and father all remain in the US.
Sanyasi and the other deportees were not undocumented and came to the US legally. Most – if not all – have been convicted of crimes of varying severity, though many served their full sentences before being deported. Under US law, non-citizens can lose their visas if convicted of certain crimes.
They now find themselves in an extraordinary diplomatic gray zone, with no documentation for either the US, Bhutan or Nepal, where many are currently residing.
Gopal Krishna Siwakoti, Nepal-based president of the International Institute for Human Rights, Environment and Development, estimates 30 people have been deported by the US to Bhutan so far, while at least two dozen more are in detention facilities awaiting deportation.
All the refugees deported to Bhutan were expelled to India once they arrived, Siwakoti said. Most of them made their way to Nepal, though some are still in India. Many are in hiding, he said.
Four of the US deportees have now been ordered deported by a second country, after they were arrested and briefly detained by the Nepali government for crossing the border illegally. However, Tikaram Dhakal, the director of Nepal’s Department of Immigration, told CNN it has nowhere to deport these people.
“We are in a dilemma: the US is unlikely to accept them back, and deporting them to Bhutan is not straightforward either.”
Bhutan, a small Buddhist kingdom of roughly 800,000 nestled between India and Tibet in the Himalayas, is often revered for its sustainable approach to tourism and national happiness index, but it has a dark history of crackdowns on ethnic minorities.
In the late 1970s, the government of Bhutan began cracking down on ethnic Nepalis who had migrated to southern Bhutan in the 19th century, introducing a series of discriminatory policies designed to exclude Lhotshampa.
From 1989, the government pushed the “Bhutanization” of the country by enforcing a dress code and banning the Nepali language, aggressively clamping down on anyone who resisted. Faced with abuse, threats and coercion, the Lhotshampa fled.
It has long been a bedrock of US and international law not to send someone to a country where they could face persecution. But the administration of US President Donald Trump has increasingly deported people to states with grave human rights records, such as Libya and South Sudan.
Siwakoti said it was a “mistake on the part of the US government” to deport the Lhotshampa back to Bhutan, “because these people don’t have a country.”
“These people’s belonging, their existence, their ownership of the country, was completely written off – formally, legally – by the Royal Government of Bhutan,” Siwakoti said. “They became completely stateless.”
Bhutan has refused to receive Lhotshampa refugees. But during Trump’s presidency, countries that have historically accepted few – if any – deportees from the US are now opening their doors, under pressure of sanctions and tariffs.
Bhutan was initially included in a draft “red” list prepared by US diplomatic and security officials of 11 countries whose citizens would be barred from entering the US, which was published in March by The New York Times.
But when the final list of 19 countries targeted for full or partial travel bans was released in June, Bhutan was not included.
The first deportation flight from the US to Bhutan was at the end of March.
Siwakoti said he believes Bhutan accepted the deportees to appease the US, but never intended to let them stay.
ICE and the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to questions from CNN.
A US State Department spokesperson said it would not discuss its diplomatic communications with other governments.
“Foreign governments will make decisions regarding the immigration status of aliens removed from the United States in accordance with their respective domestic laws and international obligations,” the spokesperson said.
CNN was unable to reach Bhutan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment. The Consulate of Bhutan in New York did not respond to an email request from CNN.
Dhakal, the Nepali government official, said Nepal cannot accept the refugees and is currently in discussions with the US government to come up with a solution.
The Beldangi camp looks different from when Ashish Subedi last lived here a decade ago. There is electricity; his father’s bamboo hut is now fortified with metal; and running water comes from a tap, rather than a well. Dogs, cows and chickens roam the dusty roads.
Subedi never imagined he would be back here, in the same place where he and his family took refuge years ago. Subedi was convicted of a felony sexual offense in Ohio in 2022, according to court records, and served his two-year sentence before he was deported back to Bhutan in March.
He is among the deportees who were arrested by Nepali authorities, though they were eventually released from detention after Subedi’s father filed a habeas corpus petition with Nepal’s Supreme Court.
Without travel documents, it is unlikely he and the others will be expelled from Nepal anytime soon. In the meantime, the government is not permitting them to leave the refugee camps.
“We are living in darkness, with no clear path forward,” Subedi told CNN. “The lack of documentation and restricted movement make it nearly impossible to rebuild our lives. We feel trapped, with limited options and a constant sense of insecurity.”
Subedi said he hopes to return to the US, where his wife and 3-year-old daughter still live.
“Being sent back to Bhutan is not an option for us – it would likely mean imprisonment,” he said.
Back in the US, the recent deportations have sent shock waves through communities of Bhutanese refugees.
Tilak Niroula, a refugee and community leader in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, said Bhutanese refugees have embraced life in the US and laid down roots there.
“Since we were forcefully evicted from Bhutan, and we do not have a country to call home, we call this country, the US, our home,” he said.
Niroula said he and other advocates want anyone who commits a crime to face justice – but insists deportation isn’t the answer.
“If somebody got involved in any kind of criminal activities, we do have a due process,” he said.
“Family separation is not a solution.”