{"id":647097,"date":"2026-03-11T03:56:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T03:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/647097\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T03:56:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T03:56:13","slug":"more-women-from-iranian-soccer-team-granted-asylum-in-australia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/647097\/","title":{"rendered":"More women from Iranian soccer team granted asylum in Australia"},"content":{"rendered":"

GOLD COAST, Australia (AP) \u2014 Two more members of the Iranian women\u2019s soccer team<\/a> were granted asylum in Australia before their teammates departed the country, Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said Wednesday, but one of the woman later changed her mind and will return to Iran.<\/p>\n

A total of six women from the Iranian squad will remain in Australia on humanitarian visas after accepting offers of asylum<\/a> shortly before their scheduled return home, Burke said. The names of the seven team members initially granted asylum, and their photographs, have been widely published \u2014 including by Burke \u2014 and it was not immediately clear which of the women had reversed her decision.<\/p>\n

The rest of the team\u2019s departure from Sydney, Australia late Tuesday happened during fraught and outraged protests at the delegation\u2019s hotel and at the airport. Iranian Australians sought to prevent the women from leaving the country, citing fears for their safety in Iran. <\/p>\n

Burke on Wednesday morning announced that one player and a team staffer had joined five athletes who had decided to stay in Australia. Hours later, however, he told Australia\u2019s federal parliament in Canberra that one of the women had spoken to her departed teammates and decided to return home too.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was advised by her teammates and coach to contact the Iranian embassy and to get collected,\u201d Burke said. \u201cAs a result of that, it meant that the Iranian embassy now knew the location of where everybody was.\u201d<\/p>\n

The six women remaining in Australia were immediately moved to a different location, the minister said. <\/p>\n

Women offered asylum as they departed<\/p>\n

The fluid nature of the situation capped a fraught time in Australia for the Iranian players. The team arrived in Australia for the Women\u2019s Asian Cup last month, before the Iran war<\/a> began Feb. 28. The team was knocked out of the tournament<\/a> over the weekend and faced the prospect of returning to a country under bombardment.<\/p>\n

Australia\u2019s government Wednesday disclosed their final attempts to ensure each member of the team could consider an asylum offer. Burke said that as the women passed through border security, they were taken aside individually to speak to Australian officials and interpreters, without minders present.<\/p>\n

\u201cAustralia made the offer because we are so impressed by these women as individuals,\u201d he said. \u201cThe choice that Australia gave, the choice of government officials standing in front of you and saying it is up to you, is a choice that every individual should be entitled to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some called their families in Iran to discuss the offer, Burke added, but no further members of the delegation decided to remain in Australia. <\/p>\n

\u201cEverything was about ensuring the dignity for those individuals to make a choice,\u201d he said. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t take away the pressure of the context for these individuals, of what might have been said to them beforehand, what pressures they might have felt there were on other family members.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those who sought asylum received temporary humanitarian visas, which would lead to permanent residency in Australia, Burke said. He added that some of the delegation were not offered visas because they had connections to Iran\u2019s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Team\u2019s fate drew national spotlight<\/p>\n

The Iranian team became popular figures in Australia during the tournament. Iranian groups in Australia had urged the government to halt the women\u2019s departure after the team drew widespread news coverage in Australia when players didn\u2019t sing the Iranian anthem before their first match.<\/p>\n

The players didn\u2019t explain publicly why they did not sing. They later saluted and sang the anthem before their other games. During the tournament, the women mostly declined to comment on the situation at home and made no political remarks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen those players were silent at the start of their first match in Australia, that silence was heard as a roar all around the world,\u201d Burke said. \u201cWe responded by saying, the invitation is there. In Australia you can be safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was not clear exactly how many people were in the delegation, but an official squad list named 26 players, plus coaching and other staff. Burke rejected suggestions that Australian officials should have done more to stop the women\u2019s departure.<\/p>\n

\u201cAustralia\u2019s objective here was not to force people to make a particular decision,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re not that sort of nation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The minister said he had viewed widely published footage that appeared to show a woman being led by the hand by her teammates from the team\u2019s hotel on Queensland\u2019s Gold Coast to their bus. Whether that constituted coercion was a matter for local Australian police, Burke said. <\/p>\n

Iran criticizes Trump\u2019s remarks<\/p>\n

\u201cIran welcomes its children with open arms and the government guarantees their security,\u201d Iranian first Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref said Tuesday. \u201cNo one has the right to interfere in the family affairs of the Iranian nation and play the role of a nanny who is kinder than a mother,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

The team\u2019s fate had attracted international attention, including from U.S. President Donald Trump, who decried the Australian government Monday for not offering the women asylum. It emerged Tuesday that discussions between Australian officials and some of the women had already been unfolding privately.<\/p>\n

Iranian state TV said the country\u2019s football federation had asked international soccer bodies to review what it called Trump\u2019s \u201cdirect political interference in football,\u201d warning such remarks could disrupt the 2026 World Cup.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Graham-McLay reported from Wellington, New Zealand. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GOLD COAST, Australia (AP) \u2014 Two more members of the Iranian women\u2019s soccer team were granted asylum in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":647098,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[18808,4740,46249,69,57,83,3461,6087,274977,50,221,62,46181,53703,1707,103,107],"class_list":["post-647097","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-asylum","tag-australia","tag-australia-government","tag-donald-trump","tag-general-news","tag-iran","tag-iran-government","tag-iran-war","tag-mohammad-reza-aref","tag-news","tag-soccer","tag-sports","tag-tony-burke","tag-womens-soccer","tag-womens-sports","tag-world","tag-world-news"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116208532729534878","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=647097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/647098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=647097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=647097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=647097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}