Iran’s footballers arrived in Mexico on Sunday after the Iranian ambassador in the country said they would have to go in and out of the United States on the day of World Cup matches.
The war between Iran and the US began in February and the implications for the Iranian team at the World Cup in the US, Mexico and Canada June 11-July 19 have changed almost weekly.
There were no problems entering Mexico on Sunday, the Iranian football federation said. The squad reached their base in the city of Tijuana, directly on the US border, after the bus briefly stopped at the entrance to the airport where around 20 Iranian fans waved flags.
All members of the Iranian squad have received visas for Mexico but all Iran’s group matches are in the US.
The Iranian federation said in May it would relocate the team’s training camp from the US state of Arizona to Tijuana.
Iran’s ambassador to Mexico, Abolfazl Pasandideh, said the team would now have to dash in and out of the US.
“They can enter [the US] in the morning and on the same day they have to leave,” Mexican media cited Pasandideh as saying late on Saturday.
Pasandideh also told reporters in Tijuana, according to a Spanish translation by an interpreter, that a total of 15 Iranian officials have not yet received visas to enter the US for the World Cup. All players appear to have visas.
Iran hopes the officials will receive visas before their first match against New Zealand in Los Angeles on June 15.
Iranian media says Iran’s football federation president Mehdi Taj is among those without a visa.
According to the Iranian news agency ISNA on Sunday, Taj said the US was being malicious and it was not known “what other shameful acts the Americans will still commit at the airport.”
Iran is lodging a protest with football’s governing body FIFA, the federation chief stressed.
The Iranian team also meet Belgium in LA on June 21 and then face Egypt on June 26 in Seattle, in the north-western state of Washington.
