Iran footballers hand passports to US embassy for World Cup visa approval

Iran’s football squad, whose participation in the World Cup remains uncertain, have handed their passports to the United States embassy in Turkiye for visas, the head of their football federation has said.

Mehdi Taj said on Friday that Iran were following instructions from FIFA, world football’s governing body.

Their quest for the visas comes as Iran and the US remain locked in negotiations to end the Middle East war that began in February with a massive wave of US and Israeli strikes on the Islamic republic.

“Yesterday, I had discussions with FIFA regarding the US visas,” Taj said. “We were told to submit all passports to the US embassy in Ankara.”

The Iranian team is due to fly from Turkiye to Spain on Saturday before travelling on to their base camp in Mexico, which has issued visas to the squad.

“We are waiting to see what happens today or, at the latest, tomorrow, because our national team needs to receive these passports and travel with them to Tijuana,” said Taj.

Taj said the Iranian football federation had “raised certain points and requests, in such a way that FIFA was told that if they [the Americans] do not issue visas for the players, some members of our technical staff, and other sections of our delegation, we may make other decisions”.

“My assessment is that all visas will be issued in full, and there most likely will not be any problem in this regard,” he added.

The Iranians relocated their World Cup base, which initially was planned to be in Tucson, Arizona, to the northwestern Mexican border city of Tijuana.

All three of their group matches are in the US.

They open with two games in Los Angeles: against New Zealand on 15 June and Belgium on 21 June, and play Egypt on 27 June in Seattle.

Iran beat Mali 2-0 on Thursday in their final friendly before the World Cup.