The team was branded “traitors” by the Islamic regime after they refused to sing the Iranian national anthem before their Women’s Asian Cup game on the Gold Coast
Three more players from the Iranian women’s football team who were granted asylum in Australia over fears for their safety have decided to return home. (Getty)Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said three more have similarly reversed their decision overnight and will join the rest of their team to return to Iran.
Iranian media has identified the trio as Mona Hamoudi, Zahra Sarbali and Zahra Meshkinkar.
“After telling Australian officials they had made this decision, the players were given repeated chances to talk about their options,” Burke said in a statement this morning.
“While the Australian government can ensure that opportunities are provided and communicated, we cannot remove the context in which the players are making these incredibly difficult decisions.
“The Australian government has done everything we could to make sure these women were provided with the chance for a safe future in Australia.
“Australians should be proud that it was in our country that these women experienced a nation presenting them with genuine choices and interacted with authorities seeking to help them.”
Three of the women who have backflipped and returned to Iran. (Tasnim News Agency/X)
The Tasnim News Agency, which is linked to the Iranian regime, said the three are “returning to the warm embrace of their family and homeland”.
“The disgraceful failure of the American-Australian project and another failure for Trump,” it said in a statement.
“Mona Hamoudi, Zahra Sarbali and Zahra Meshkinkar, two players and a member of the technical staff of the national women’s football team, have withdrawn their asylum application in Australia and are currently leaving for Malaysia and returning to the warm embrace of their family and homeland.
“This is while previously, Mohaddeseh Zolfi, another player of our country’s national women’s football team, with her heart for the homeland and the Iranian flag, rejected the offer to stay in Australia and decided to return to Iran.
“The national spirit and patriotism of the Iranian women’s national football team girls defeated the enemy’s plans against this team, which had been widely reflected in the hostile media with numerous projections.”
Members of the Iranian football delegation who originally elected to stay in Australia. (Tony Burke)
Iran is known to put pressure on family members back home to target their citizens across the world, according to political scientist Simon Jackman.
“At the end of the day, it’s what’s in the minds of these young women who are in an impossible situation,” he told Today.
“The best-intended elements of our government are doing the best they can, even though it is a deeply personal decision, weighing up what they may be being back channelled to them when they get on the phone and talk to mum and dad or extended family back home.
“You cannot imagine what that must be like for a young woman in a country a long way from home, just immense pressure.”
The team arrived in Australia for the Women’s Asian Cup last month before the joint US-Israeli airstrikes on Iran began on February 28.
Tony Burke travelled to Queensland to sign off on the humanitarian visas. (Twitter/Tony Burke)
But their failure to sing their national anthem sparked concerns around Australia that they could face retaliation upon their arrival in Iran. 
US President Donald Trump joined the call for the federal government to intervene and help them. 
Behind the scenes, Burke and his department had travelled to Brisbane to speak with the women separately via a translator and learned that an initial five players out of the 26 players wanted to remain in Australia.
Federal police moved them to a secret location and they were granted humanitarian visas, while the remaining group flew out of Sydney on March 9.
Another player and a staff member later also accepted asylum, one of whom later chose to return to Iran.
After three more had a change of heart overnight, only three Iranian footballers who have claimed asylum are left in Australia. 
– With Associated Press
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