A US deportation flight carrying Iranian nationals to Iran via Pakistan was abruptly cancelled on Sunday morning, according to an attorney who spoke to some of the detainees due to be deported.
At least eight Iranians had been loaded onto a plane in Mesa, Arizona, for a flight headed first to Georgia and then on to Pakistan, according to Ali Rahnama, an attorney with the Iranian American Legal Defense Fund who filed emergency motions on behalf of some of the detainees. The flight was cancelled without explanation, he said.
Court documents unsealed days earlier showed the Trump administration had said as recently as mid-October that it planned to deport the Iranians to Iran, even as the war there continues, via an unnamed third country. The lawsuit, filed in July, alleges the US government illegally shared confidential information about Iranians seeking asylum in the US with Iranian officials.
The fund said the flights would “reportedly mark the first deportation of Iranians to Iran since the US-Iran war began.” Its executive director, Yasmin Chubin, said it was difficult to comprehend why the US would forcibly deport Iranians, including asylum seekers, to Iran amid ongoing military hostilities, warning the consequences “could be irreversible and individuals may face persecution, torture, or death.”
There were three deportation flights to Iran between September 2025 and January 2026, carrying more than 100 Iranian nationals, according to the Associated Press.
The Department of Homeland Security declined to comment on the flight. In a statement, an unnamed spokesperson said Immigration and Customs Enforcement does not comment on “prospective removal operations, including flight schedules, passenger manifests, destinations, or individual case details.”
US District Judge Ana C. Reyes has not ruled on the claims but has ordered the government to give the court 24 hours’ notice of any finalised plans to deport Iranians to Iran or to any other country, and five days’ written notice before any such deportation is carried out. In a court filing on Sunday, the defence fund argued the administration may have violated the judge’s directive.
At least one person on the cancelled flight had volunteered to return to Iran after nearly two years in detention, Rahnama said, out of desperation to leave what he described as inhumane imprisonment. It is not clear how many of the others may have volunteered.
Source: Associated Press — https://www.arabnews.com/world/deportation-flight-of-iranians-from-us-scuttled-at-last-minute-attorney-says-3010609
