In brief
- Iranian World Cup players have been granted visas to play in the United States.
- Iran's participation in the tournament has been uncertain after the US and Israel launched strikes against the country in February.
Iran has slammed World Cup host the United States over what it called "discriminatory treatment" by not granting visas for some members of the Iranian delegation to attend the tournament.
A White House official on Friday confirmed visas had been granted to players, but Iran announced on Saturday that some of its technical and administrative staff had had their visas denied.
"Why do you not say that visas were denied to a large portion of the managerial and executive staff, technical advisers, and others who are an integral part of any national football team?" the Iranian embassy in Turkey said in a post on X, referring to an earlier announcement by US envoy Tom Barrack that visas had been granted to players.
"You have now escalated the deliberate and discriminatory treatment against Iran's national football team to its highest level," the embassy added.
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Early in the day Barrack had praised the US embassy in Ankara over its "work processing visas for Iran's national football team" after the head of the Iranian football federation, Mehdi Taj, said on the same day that Iranian delegation had submitted passports for visas.
But later reports from the Iranian media, including sports media Varzesh3, said members of the delegation, including Taj along with executive members and analysts had not been granted visas.
Iran state TV has reported that 15 members of the country's World Cup delegation were denied visas.
World Cup touched by geopolitics
The war in the Middle East has turned the World Cup — the biggest global sporting event — into a geopolitical contest, with both sides appearing to use the tournament for political posturing.
It is the first World Cup, since its inception in 1930, in which a host nation is set to receive a country it is at war with.
Iran negotiated a last-minute move of the team's base from Arizona to Tijuana, Mexico, due to visa issues and a growing sentiment in Iran that the squad’s presence in the United States should be kept to a minimum.
They are scheduled to land in Tijuana early on Sunday local time.
Iran is due to play their first Group G match on 15 June against New Zealand in Los Angeles, where they will also face Belgium before taking on Egypt in Seattle.
The US had never formally said it did not want the Iran team to stay on its territory, Iran's ambassador to Mexico, Abolfazl Pasandideh Pasandideh, said.
However, US secretary of state Marco Rubio on Tuesday said that the US would not allow Iran to include in its World Cup delegation individuals linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), a powerful branch of the Iranian armed forces.
Mehdi Taj, president of Iran's soccer federation, was denied entry for the tournament draw in Washington in December. He is a former commander in the IRGC.
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Iran's desire to compete in the World Cup underscored its efforts to reach a resolution in the war with the US, Pasandideh said.
"Iran's participation in the World Cup — even on the soil of what is seen as its enemy — shows that Iran seeks peace," Pasandideh said, speaking through a Spanish interpreter at the Iranian embassy in Mexico City.
Progress in peace talks between Iran and the US has been slow, with both sides seemingly inching toward an interim agreement even as they continue to carry out military strikes.
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