US to deport hundreds of Iranians in coming weeks

As many as 400 people to be returned to Iran under agreement with Washington

The deportations are a rare example of co-operation between Washington and Tehran. LightRocket / Getty Images

The US will deport hundreds of Iranians back to Iran in the coming weeks, with the first 120 set to depart in the coming days, Iranian state media has reported.

As many as 400 Iranians would be returning to their homeland as part of an agreement with Washington, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported, quoting an official. Most of those to be deported were said to have crossed into the US illegally from Mexico.

The Iranian official said the first plane carrying Iranians would arrive in the coming days, after stopping over in Qatar on the way. Authorities in Doha have not confirmed that this is the case.

The deportation of Iranians, not yet publicly acknowledged by Washington, comes amid high tension between the two countries after the US bombed Iranian nuclear sites in June.

The deportations – a rare example of co-operation between Washington and Tehran – are the result of months of talks, according to the New York Times, which first broke the story.

The US State Department did not immediately comment.

The move represents a contradiction between the priorities of US President Donald Trump – who campaigned for re-election on a promise to halt illegal immigration – and a decades-long US policy of welcoming Iranian dissidents.

Before and after Iran’s 1979 revolution, a large number of its citizens fled to the US. Since then, Washington has been consistent in allowing Iranians fleeing religious, sexual or political persecution to seek residency.

Tehran has criticised Washington for hosting exiles in the past, while US prosecutors have accused Iran of hiring assassins to murder dissidents in America.

The UN last week reimposed sanctions on Iran's nuclear programme, over what western nations call Tehran's failure to adhere to the terms of a 2015 treaty regulating atomic energy development in the country.