A top Immigration and Customs Enforcement official on Thursday detailed appalling and unsafe conditions faced by a group of deportees, and the government officials guarding them, at a U.S. military base in the Horn of Africa nation of Djibouti.

Melissa Harper, the number two official at ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations, bemoaned a lack of adequate security equipment at Camp Lemonnier, a U.S. base in Djibouti. In a sworn court declaration, she described illness among the detainees and government agents, inadequate medical care, and 100-degree outdoor temperatures. She detailed risks from malaria, exposure to smoke from nearby burn pits, and potential attacks from militants in Yemen.

“The aliens are currently being held in a conference room in a converted Conex shipping container

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