Dramatic new footage has emerged of Iranian officials scrambling to hunt down five members of the country’s women’s soccer team after realising they had fled their Gold Coast hotel on Monday in an attempt to seek asylum in Australia.
The group, who were competing in the Asia Cup and refused to sing the national anthem, had fled through an underground carpark.
Footage shared by a supporter showed Iranian security agents and team officials running down a stairwell as she chases and hurls abuse at them.
“This is Australia now, you are in Australia motherf****r, you are in Australia,” she says, repeatedly calling them IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps).
“You better run, we are gonna get you now, you better run, you have no rights here.”
The defeated Iranians then make their way back up the fire escape as the woman continues taunting them.
“I’m here at the hotel and it looks like the IRGC figured out what we’re trying to do,” she said in a second clip.
“I just chased some of the IRGC-aligned staff down the stairs it looks like a couple of the players were trying to get out and they found out about it.”
A total of six Iranian players and one official have remained in Australia after being granted asylum by the government.
On Tuesday, Mohaddeseh Zolfi and Zahra Soltan Meshkeh Kar took up the Australian government’s offer of asylum, joining teammates Zahra Sarbali, Mona Hamoudi, Zahra Ghanbari, Fatemeh Pasandideh and Atefeh Ramazani-Zadeh, as the rest of the Iranian women’s team flew out of Sydney.
The departure of the remainder of the team en route to Malaysia was again engulfed in drama, as chaos erupted outside the hotel after protesters attempted to stop their bus.
Some members of the team appeared to pull one player by the arm and collar towards the bus as the team left the hotel.
One man was pictured lying on the ground, cradling a small, white dog.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke on Wednesday confirmed that an additional two members of the team — a player and a support person — had been issued humanitarian visas, joining the five female players who fled on Monday.
Mr Burke confirmed every team member leaving Sydney airport was offered a private opportunity to accept Australia’s offer.
“With the assistance of the Australian Federal Police, they were separated from the rest of the group and taken to a safe location,’’ he said.
“With the exception of a small number of people, where we had made the decision that we did not want to make a direct offer, all the players remaining and most of the support people were taken into interview rooms.
“They were given a choice in that situation. What we made sure of was there was no rushing. There was no pressure. Everything was about ensuring the dignity for those individuals to make a choice.”
After the plane had departed, Mr Burke said he spoke with officials to acknowledge their role in giving the delegation a choice.
“They were emotional meetings. They were emotional meetings for them and for the people from Home Affairs and Border Force who were meeting with them, I can’t begin to imagine what people have been weighing up,’’ he said.
“I reminded them that they should still be very proud of who we are as a country and their role as the face of Australia when people were being offered a choice.
“These individuals were meeting a government that said, the choice is up to you, and here is the opportunity if you want to take it, but the choice and the dignity of that decision is yours as Australians, we should be proud that we’re that sort of country.”
For the seven members who accepted the offer, Mr Burke said, “they are now on humanitarian visas, and the processing will soon start for them to move to what’s called a resolution of status, which is a permanent visa.”
“I had no intention, after everything that these individuals have gone through, for them to have to fight through the courts for permanent status in Australia,’’ he said.
“For everybody who was given that choice, I’m really glad we did that, and for the seven people who took up that offer, we as a nation, are lucky that you chose us, and I think they are only just beginning to realise just how welcome they are here in Australia.”
Meanwhile, senior Iranian government and football officials have accused Australia of taking the team members “hostage”, The Daily Mail reports.
Football Federation Chief Mehdi Taj, in comments to an IRGC-linked media outlet, claimed Prime Minister Anthony Albanese ordered police to stop Iranian players leaving the country.
“After the game, unfortunately, the Australian police came and intervened, removing one or two of the players from the hotel, according to the news we have,” he told Iran’s Tasnim News Agency on Wednesday.
‘They martyred our girls in Minab, 160 of them, and in this incident they are taking our girls hostage. They did a terrible thing. Last night, some people came and lay down in front of the car they were driving to the airport.
“They completely blocked them at the gate and told everyone to become refugees.”