“Burkina Faso is a place of dignity … not a place of expulsion,” said its Foreign Minister Karamoko Jean-Marie Traoré, rejecting US President Donald Trump’s deportation deal.
Deeming Trump’s proposal for Burkina Faso to accept foreign nationals he is deporting from the US as “indecent”, he said it was “totally contrary to the value of dignity, which is … the very essence of the vision of Captain Ibrahim Traoré.”
Coming to power in 2022 after the ouster of Roch Kaboré’s unpopular regime, propped up by France, Traoré expelled French troops, consolidating his mass support in the country.
His avowed anti-imperialism and pan-Africanism have won him admirers across Africa and Black and Afro-descendant communities in the West. It has distinguished him from many other African heads of state, who have often yielded to Western hegemony.
In recent months, Swaziland, Ghana, Rwanda, and South Sudan have agreed to accept foreign nationals deported from the US, while many other countries are in negotiation, with the US offering monetary inducements or preferential visa processing in return.
Read More: Exiled Swazi activists protest Trump deportation deal outside US embassy in South Africa
Snubbed by Burkina Faso, the US appears to have reacted with punitive actions. Redirecting visa applications to its embassy in neighboring Togo, the US Embassy in Burkina Faso “has temporarily paused all routine visa services effective October 10, 2025. This pause includes immigrant visas and nonimmigrant visas for tourists, business travelers, students, exchange visitors, and most other nonimmigrant categories,” said a note on the embassy website on October 10.
The State Department’s Consular Affairs further adds that those who have already paid for existing appointments will not be refunded. “Appointment scheduling will resume after the pause is lifted. At that time, appointments affected by the pause will be rescheduled, and the applicants will be notified,” it explained, without providing any timeline for resumption.
“Is this a way to put pressure on us? Is this blackmail?” the foreign minister questioned in a state broadcast held hours after the announcement by the US embassy. “Whatever it is … Burkina Faso is a place of dignity, a destination, not a place of expulsion.”
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