Iran has said that 120 nationals being deported from the US under Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown will fly home this week.
“One hundred and twenty people should be deported and flown home over the next couple of days,” foreign ministry consular affairs official Hossein Noushabadi told the Tasnim news agency.
“The US immigration service has decided to deport around 400 Iranians currently in the United States, most of them after entering illegally.”
The New York Times reported that a US-chartered flight took off from Louisiana on Monday and was scheduled to arrive in Iran by way of Qatar later on Tuesday.
The deportation, an uncommon instance of cooperation between the two countries, came after months of talks, the NYT said.
The US president plans to deport a record number of people living in the US without legal status, arguing that it is necessary after what he describes as a high number of illegal border crossings under his Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden.
However, his administration has struggled to increase deportation levels, even as it has created new avenues to send migrants to countries other than their own.
The identities of the Iranians and their reasons for attempting to immigrate to the US were not immediately clear, the paper said, adding that some had volunteered to leave after being in detention centres for months, and some had not.
According to the New York Times, the deportees have been given reassurances that they will be safe and will not face any problems.
The US in February deported 119 people from different countries, including Iran, to Panama as part of an agreement between the two countries.