Guatemala City, Jun 10 (AP) The United States resumed deportation flights to Guatemala Tuesday, nearly a month after the Central American country refused to accept them.

A flight from Alexandria, Louisiana landed in the Guatemalan capital Tuesday afternoon.

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At least 186 Guatemalan deportees had tested positive for COVID-19 after arriving in the country even after US assurances that they were healthy.

The flights scheduled for Tuesday and Thursday this week will carry fewer deportees, about 50, said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Patricia Letona.

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She did not provide details on any new procedures to guarantee the health of the deportees.

“We have already requested specific information with respect to the coordination" with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and what health protocols they will follow, she said.

The Foreign Ministry says about 5,500 Guatemalans are in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

More than 2,500 of those have a final deportation order and the remainder still have a pending process.

Two more flights are scheduled for next week.

The presidential commission in charge of the government's response to the health crisis made the decision to resume the flights, Letona said.

Guatemala suspended the flights May 13 after nearly all of the 65 passengers aboard a flight tested positive.

Some “humanitarian” flights carrying unaccompanied children and families detained at the US southwest border had been allowed to continue.

Since the epidemic began in Guatemala in mid-March, the country has received 2,160 deportees from the US, including adults and children.(AP)

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)