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Tufts University Student Rumeysa Ozturk Ordered Released From ICE Detention

The doctoral student, targeted for pro-Palestine article, recounts being ‘afraid’ and ‘crying’ during her detention. Rumeysa Ozturk, a Tufts University doctoral student detained as part of President Donald Trump’s crackdown on pro-Palestine visa holders, has been ordered to be released from immigration custody. On Friday, Vermont-based US District Judge William Sessions ruled that Ozturk’s “detention cannot stand”. “The court finds that she does not pose a danger to the community, nor does she present a risk of flight. The court orders the government to release Ms Ozturk from custody immediately,” Sessions said. Lawyers for Ozturk, a Turkish citizen in the US on a student visa, had argued that the Trump administration’s efforts to detain and deport her violated her constitutional rights, including to free speech and due process. Sessions appeared to side with the legal team’s argument, saying Ozturk’s “continued detention potentially chills the speech of the millions and millions of individuals in this country who are not citizens”. Ozturk’s lawyer, Mahsa Khanbabai, said in a statement she was “relieved and ecstatic” about the judge’s order but that it came far too late. “When did speaking up against oppression become a crime? When did speaking up against genocide become something to be imprisoned for?” she said. The 30-year-old Ozturk had appeared at the Vermont hearing via video from a detention centre in Louisiana, wearing an orange jumpsuit and a hijab. During her testimony, she recounted being surrounded and detained by plain-clothed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents near her student housing in Somerville, Massachusetts, on March 25. Surveillance video of that incident later spread online, sparking outrage. She said she suffered a series of asthma attacks, 12 in total, as she was being transferred to Louisiana. The first came at the airport in Atlanta, she said, and she did not have all of the medication she needed. “I was afraid, and I was crying,” she said. The doctoral student told the judge her studies related to community engagement in children in warzones. She was among dozens of student visa holders and permanent residents targeted by the Trump administration for pro-Palestine advocacy. The administration has relied on an obscure provision of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, which allows the secretary of state to deport someone deemed to “adversely affect US foreign policy interests”. Officials have broadly portrayed pro-Palestinian protests and other forms of advocacy as “anti-Semitic”, despite providing scant evidence in individual cases. Still, Ozturk’s detention has been notable given her relatively low public profile, with her only public advocacy coming in the form of an article she co-wrote with three other students for the campus newspaper. The piece criticised the university’s response to student-led calls for administrators to acknowledge “Palestinian genocide” and “disclose its investments and divest from companies” with links to Israel. Speaking at Friday’s hearings, Ozturk said Tufts would provide her housing if she is released, and her friends and lawyers would drive her to future court hearings. She added that she remained committed to finishing her PhD degree. The judge’s order on Friday came just over a week after Mohsen Mahdawi, a US permanent resident and pro-Palestine protest leader at Columbia University, was released from immigration detention by another federal judge in Vermont. On Thursday, Mahdawi, who still faces an ongoing deportation case, announced the creation of the Vermont Immigration Legal Defense Fund, to help immigrants facing deportation hearings. Speaking to Al Jazeera’s Kristen Saloomey, Mahdawi recounted being detained by immigration officials as he attended a citizenship hearing in Vermont in April. He said ICE agents had sought to transfer him to the more conservative jurisdiction in Louisiana, as they had done with Ozturk and Mahmoud Khalil, another Columbia University protest leader targeted for deportation. Mahdawi added that the move was meant to isolate him from his community and legal support. “They had the aeroplane ticket, commercial flight printed with my name on it, but I was lucky enough that we missed the flight by nine minutes,” Mahdawi said. That brief window, he explained, gave his lawyers time to intervene. They sought and received a temporary restraining order preventing Mahdawi from being transferred out of the state. Mahdawi credits remaining in Vermont with paving the way to his release. “I mean, if the plan worked out as they have laid it down, we would not be having this interview,” he said. Prior to Ozturk’s hearing on Friday, Judge Sessions had ordered her to be transferred to Vermont no later than May 14, as that is where she was held at the time her lawyers filed an initial petition for her release. Sessions, however, decided to continue with her bail hearing even before Ozturk was physically moved. The Trump administration had previously appealed an earlier deadline for her transfer to Vermont, set for May 1. Ozturk has not been accused of any crime. The Trump administration has offered little justification for its decision to revoke Ozturk’s student visa, pointing only to the article she co-authored and claiming she was “creating a hostile environment for Jewish students”. The administration has broadly claimed that visa holders are not afforded the same constitutional rights protections as US citizens, a question that could eventually be decided by the Supreme Court. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt briefly weighed in on Friday’s decision during her daily news briefing, where she reiterated the administration’s position that such rulings are tantamount to judicial interference. “We’ve made quite clear that lower-level judges should not be dictating the foreign policy of the United States, and we absolutely believe that the president and the Department of Homeland Security are well within their legal rights to deport illegal immigrants,” she said. “It is a privilege, not a right, to come to this country on a visa,” she added. Follow Al Jazeera English:...

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Gunmen Kill 30 During Vicious Attack In Southeast Nigeria: Rights Group

Attack in Imo State ‘shows callous disregard for the sanctity of life’, rights group Amnesty International says. At least 30 people were killed when gunmen attacked travellers in Nigeria’s southeastern Imo State, according to Amnesty International. The human rights NGO reported on Friday that more than 20 commuter vehicles and trucks were set ablaze during a “vicious attack” along the Okigwe-Owerri road the day before. The attackers are suspected of being members of the banned separatist group, Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Amnesty said. “​​The attack … shows callous disregard for the sanctity of life. The gunmen blocked Okigwe-Owerri highway and areas of Umuna in Onuimo LGA unleashed violence in an utter show of impunity,” Amnesty wrote on X. “The Nigerian authorities must immediately and transparently investigate this attack and ensure that the actual perpetrators are brought to justice. International law requires the Nigerian government to promptly investigate unlawful killings to bring perpetrators to justice,” it added. Amnesty International strongly condemns the vicious attack on travelers yesterday 8 May 2025, along Okigwe-Owerri Road in Imo State, killing at least 30 people and burning over 20 commuter vehicles and trucks. — Amnesty International Nigeria (@AmnestyNigeria) May 9, 2025 Imo police spokesperson, Henry Okoye, confirmed that the attack took place in the early hours of Thursday, but declined to comment on the death toll. On Friday, Okoye told the Reuters news agency that one of the assailants had been killed by the police. According to a police statement, the gunmen, operating in three groups, blocked the highway at 04:00 GMT and shot sporadically. “A full-scale search and cordon operation is currently underway, with security operatives combing nearby forests and surrounding areas where the suspects are believed to be hiding,” the police said. Nigeria’s Premium Times also reported that the police commissioner of Imo State, Aboki Danjuma, led a joint tactical team of security operatives to the scene. According to Danjuma, the joint security team comprised personnel from Nigeria’s army, the police, and the State Security Service. The IPOB, which the Nigerian government has classed as an outlawed organisation, has been campaigning for the secession of southeastern Nigeria, where the majority of people belong to the Igbo ethnic group. Following the late 1960s civil war that engulfed the Biafra region, killing more than one million people, separatist groups have continued to push for an independent state from the southeast and in some parts of the south of Nigeria. Follow Al Jazeera English:...

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Newark Mayor Ras Baraka Arrested During ICE Detention Centre Protest

US attorney says Baraka ‘committed trespass’ during protest of facility, which he argues opened without proper permits. Rights groups and Democratic officials have decried the arrest of the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, during a protest at an immigration detention centre. Mayor Ras Baraka had joined several lawmakers at the detention centre, called Delaney Hall, for a demonstration on Friday. For weeks, he has been among those protesting the recently opened 1,000-bed centre, which critics see as a key link in President Donald Trump’s mass deportation efforts. Those in attendance said Baraka sought to enter the facility along with members of the United States Congress on Friday, but he was denied entry. A video reviewed by The Associated Press showed a federal official in a jacket with the logo for the Homeland Security Investigations unit telling Baraka he could not tour the facility because “you are not a congress member”. Baraka then left the secure area, rejoining protesters on the public side of the centre’s gate. Video showed him speaking through the gate to a man in a suit. The man said, “They’re talking about coming back to arrest you.” “I’m not on their property. They can’t come out on the street and arrest me,” Baraka replied. Moments later, several Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, some wearing face coverings, surrounded the mayor and others on the public side of the gate. Baraka was dragged back through the security gate in handcuffs, while protesters yelled, “Shame!” In a subsequent post on the social media platform X, Alina Habba, Trump’s former personal lawyer and acting US attorney for New Jersey, said Baraka had “committed trespass and ignored multiple warnings” to leave. “He has willingly chosen to disregard the law. That will not stand in this state,” Habba wrote. “He has been taken into custody. NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW.” US Representative LaMonica McIver was also at the centre on Friday, along with Representatives Bonnie Watson Coleman and Robert Menendez Jr, to conduct what they called an “oversight inspection”. In a post on X, McIver said Baraka “did nothing wrong” and had already left the facility at the time of his arrest. “This is unacceptable,” McIver said in the video. For its part, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security accused the lawmakers of “storming” the facility in a “bizarre political stunt”. Baraka has said the detention centre — located in Newark, not far from New York City — opened despite not having the proper local permits and approvals. He has launched a lawsuit to halt its operations. The GEO group, which runs the centre in coordination with ICE, has denied his claims. It entered into an agreement with the federal government in February to run the Delaney Hall facility, under a 15-year contract valued at $1bn. Local elected officials swiftly condemned the federal agents’ actions, with the state’s governor, Phil Murphy, writing on X that he was “outraged by the unjust arrest” of Baraka. Murphy called the mayor an “exemplary public servant who has always stood up for our most vulnerable mayors” and appealed for his release. The governor noted that New Jersey had previously passed a law banning private immigration detention centres in the state, a Democratic stronghold, although it was partially struck down by a federal court in 2023. An appeal is ongoing. Baraka, who is running in next month’s Democratic primary for governor, has been an outspoken critic of the Trump administration’s immigration policies. He struck a defiant tone against the Trump administration in January, after ICE raided businesses in the city he leads. “Newark will not stand by idly while people are being unlawfully terrorised,” he said at the time. Follow Al Jazeera English:...