El Paso, Texas - The US and Mexican governments have completed a two month pilot program to fly deportees into Mexico City out of the El Paso International Airport and the United States is looking to the new administration of Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto on whether to continue the program which was aimed at relieving overwhelmed Mexican border cities.

"The US government is working with the Mexican government's transition team on whether to continue this humanitarian effort," said Leticia Zamarripa, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) spokeswoman in El Paso.

Zamarripa said that 2,364 Mexican nationals flew on 18 flights, which were carried out by a contract chartered air service, between October 3rd and November 29th at an estimated cost of $1.1 million. All but three of them were men and nearly 2,000 had criminal convictions in the United States. The deportees ranged in age from 18 to 63.

The flights were not voluntary, unlike a previous program to deport Mexicans arrested by the Border Patrol that was aimed at protecting them from Arizona's deadly summer heat.

According to Zamarripa, the pilot program, known as the Interior Repatriation Initiative, did not affect other ICE enforcement and removal operations in the El Paso field office. "Normal removal operations are continuing," she said.

Two days before leaving office last week, then-Mexican Foreign Secretary Patricia Espinosa said that the Interior Repatriation Initiative was designed "to carry out the humane, safe, and orderly repatriation of Mexican nationals to the interior of Mexico" and the "new administration would work with the United States government on the decision of whether to continue."