deportee

An Indian foreign ministry spokesman said the government had raised these concerns with the US, and that as a result, on subsequent flights, women deportees were not handcuffed and shackled.

The lawyer also counts among his clientele of recent deportees a small family with a three-year-old in a similar circumstance who were instead removed to Costa Rica.

The Thai defence minister told Reuters news agency that Beijing had given assurances the deportees would be looked after.

This week, a flight carrying deportees from the US is expected to arrive in Costa Rica, another Central American country that has agreed with Washington to become a "bridge" nation for deportees.

Yet there are countries like Cuba and China that refuse to take deportees back, and other nations may cease to accept deportees depending on the state of relations with the U.S.