The United States is set to deport approximately 400 Iranian nationals, primarily those who have entered the country without proper documentation, as part of a wider immigration enforcement initiative led by President Donald Trump, a senior official from Iran disclosed on Tuesday.
According to Hossein Noushabadi, the Iranian Foreign Ministry’s director general for parliamentary affairs, “Initially, the plan is to deport 120 Iranians who unlawfully entered the US, with a majority arriving via Mexico,” as reported by the semi-official Tasnim news agency.
This deportation represents a rare moment of collaboration between the two nations, following several months of negotiations, as noted by the New York Times, which was the first to cover this development.
APPEAL FOR THE RIGHTS OF IRANIAN CITIZENS
Noushabadi mentioned that the US is “intending to deport nearly 400 Iranians, most of whom have entered the country unlawfully, reflecting the new anti-immigrant stance of the US administration.”
The first batch of 120 deportees is expected to arrive in Iran within the next couple of days, he stated.
As per a report from the New York Times, a chartered flight organized by the US departed from Louisiana on Monday and is anticipated to land in Iran through a stopover in Qatar on Tuesday.
The report indicated that while some Iranians had opted to return after spending months in detention centers, others did not voluntarily choose this option.
Noushabadi urged the US government to honor the rights of Iranian migrants residing in the United States.
“Several of those being returned held residency permits, however, they were included on the deportation list based on claims made by the US immigration office. Of course, their consent for repatriation was obtained,” he noted.
The White House and the State Department did not provide an immediate response to a request for comments from Reuters.
Trump aims to achieve a record high in deportations of individuals in the US without legal status, following what he asserts to be a surge in illegal border crossings during the administration of his Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden.
Despite this goal, his administration has faced challenges in escalating the level of deportations, even as it has established new pathways to send migrants to third countries rather than their countries of origin.
Earlier this year, in February, the US deported 119 individuals from various nations, including Iran, to Panama as part of an agreement between the two countries.
