A leaked US State Department memo reveals that the Donald Trump administration is considering a significant expansion of the travel ban announced earlier this month.The new plan includes visa restrictions or entry bans for citizens of 36 countries, including 25 African countries, including US partners in Africa such as Egypt and Djibouti, the Caribbean, Central Asia and some Pacific island nations. The US State Department has not commented on internal deliberations on the issue and there has been no clear response from the White House.Travel Ban ExpandsThe move marks a further toughening of the Trump administration's immigration policies. The memo, signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and sent to US diplomats, gave the governments of the named countries 60 days to meet the new criteria and asked them to submit an action plan to meet the requirements by 8 a.m. Wednesday, noting that many countries lack a competent central government capable of providing reliable identity documents or have serious corruption problems. It said that people from some countries have overstayed their visas and stayed in the US illegally, including countries that grant citizenship for money without residency requirements, and countries whose citizens have allegedly engaged in anti-Semitic and anti-American activities in the US.In addition, countries that are willing to accept third-country nationals deported from the US may ease these conditions. The countries under consideration under the new restriction are:Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Benin, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Cambodia, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Dominica, Ethiopia, Egypt, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Kyrgyzstan, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, South Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Tonga, Tuvalu, Uganda, Vanuatu, Zambia, Zimbabwe.This list will be added to the list of countries that were completely banned from travel by Trump's presidential decree signed on June 4. That decree banned citizens of Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Partial restrictions were also imposed on Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela.
