Images of handcuffed refugees boarding planes have emerged from the US as President Donald Trump launches a mass deportation drive days after returning to the White House.
Mr Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said on Friday: “Deportation flights have begun.”
She added that “hundreds of illegal criminals” are being deported as part of the “largest massive deportation operation in history.”
Ms Leavitt said 538 migrants were arrested, 373 for criminal activity.
Among those removed from the country were a suspected terrorist and four members of a Venezuela gang that wreaked havoc in the city of Aurora, Colorado.
Images showed the migrants boarding a plane with both their ankles and wrists in chains.
Fox News reports that the deportation flight took illegal migrants form El Paso, Texas, to Guatemala.
Four deportation flights have also been sent to Mexico.
Mexico’s foreign ministry said this week that it would “always accept the arrival of Mexicans to our territory with open arms”.
President Trump said that these flights are being organised to get “the bad, hard criminals out”.
He added: “Murderers, people that have been as bad as you get. As bad as anybody you’ve seen.”
President Trump has also ramped up efforts to block people from crossing into the US via the border with Mexico.
This week, he told US government agencies to prepare to “immediately repel, repatriate, and remove” undocumented migrants.
He also deployed 1,500 troops to the border.
Me Leavitt sent a warning to those attempting to cross on behalf of the President: “If you are thinking about breaking the laws of the United States of America, you will be returned home. You will be arrested. You will be prosecuted.”
Mr Trump’s new orders aiming to tackle illegal immigration includes changes to the definition of birthright citizenship.
The declaration of a national emergency also allows the Trump administration to remove migrants from anywhere in the US. It was previously limited to migrants detained within 100 miles of the country’s international borders.
However, this could be challenged in the courts.
President Trump could also face a legal row as, previously, detained migrants were given a notice so they could appear in court and present their asylum case.
Deportations were also not able to go ahead until a judge has issued a decision.