2026年3月11日 / 美国东部时间上午6:12 / 哥伦比亚广播公司/美联社
黄金海岸，澳大利亚 — 伊朗女子足球队在悉尼机场含泪抗议离境后，以及澳大利亚官员在航站楼内最后时刻的紧急努力确保队员们明白她们可获得庇护后，7名成员获庇护留下，其余队员乘飞机返国。
周二晚，随着球队登机时间临近，她们通过安检后，每名队员被单独叫到一旁，与官员会面，通过翻译解释她们可以选择不返回伊朗。
此前已有7名女队员接受人道主义签证，可在澳大利亚永久居留。最终，在澳大利亚内政部长托尼·伯克描述为“情绪化”的会面后，再无其他女队员接受庇护提议，球队航班载着剩余所有成员从悉尼起飞。
周三，伯克宣布其中一名留下的7人中有一人最终仍将返国，这凸显了她们决定的紧张与不确定性。
“在澳大利亚，人们可以改变主意，”伯克称，数小时前他曾在社交媒体发布7名获人道主义签证女队员的照片，身份清晰可见。
自伊朗队在亚洲杯首场比赛中奏国歌时保持沉默以来，这一事件就牵动着澳大利亚民众。此前球员们在后续比赛中唱了国歌，并未公开透露自己的观点或解释行为。
她们的沉默被一些人解读为反抗或抗议姿态，另一些人则认为是哀悼行为。
“当那些球员在澳大利亚首场比赛开始时保持沉默，这一沉默在全球引起了巨大回响，”伯克表示，“我们回应称，邀请是存在的。在澳大利亚你可以感到安全。”
球队上月抵达澳大利亚，伊朗战争于2月28日爆发。伊朗在周末被淘汰出赛事，球队面临返回战火国家的前景。
伊朗裔澳大利亚团体警告称，球员们可能因未唱国歌而面临伊朗神权政府的严重后果，尽管球员们对这一行为的意义或自身对返国的担忧未公开表态。周三，新闻媒体发布一张照片，显示一名女队员被队友拉着手腕走向前往机场的巴士，另一名队员手搭在她肩上，引发澳大利亚民众进一步愤怒。
特朗普总统周一介入此事，批评澳大利亚政府未给予女队员庇护，并在其Truth Social平台发文称：“如果你们不接收，美国将接纳她们。”
第二天有消息称，澳大利亚官员与女队员的私下讨论早已展开。
与此同时，伊朗一名官员驳斥称女队员返国并不安全。
“伊朗张开双臂欢迎自己的孩子，政府保障她们的安全，”伊朗第一副总统穆罕默德·礼萨·阿雷夫周二表示，“任何人无权干涉伊朗民族的家庭事务，扮演比母亲更慈爱的保姆角色。”
伊朗国家电视台称，该国足球协会已要求国际足球组织审查美国总统一系列所谓“直接政治干预足球”的言论，警告此类言论可能破坏2026年世界杯。
澳大利亚官员试图向公众保证，女队员们都有机会留下。但正如一名女队员尽管接受庇护仍决定返国的情况所示，现实并非如此简单。
伯克表示，在官员多日劝说后，确保每名队员有机会考虑庇护提议的努力，最终在悉尼机场的最后讨论中完成——队员们与陪同人员分开，有时间给家人打电话后再决定是否离开。
“一切都是为了确保个人有尊严地做出选择，”他说，“我们无法消除这些人所处的背景压力，比如之前可能有人对她们说过什么，她们可能感受到对其他家庭成员的压力。”
然而，航班起飞前，球队再无成员决定留在澳大利亚，伯克称“疲惫不堪”的官员担心未能满足女队员需求。
“作为一个国家，重要的是我们能提供选择，”他说。
周三，许多报纸头版刊登了接受庇护的女队员照片，标题如“勇敢的新澳大利亚人”。但数小时后，伯克称其中一名女队员在与离队队友交谈后决定返国。
“不幸的是，在做出决定时，她接受了队友和教练的建议，联系伊朗大使馆并被接走，”他表示，“结果是伊朗大使馆现在知道了所有人的位置。”
部长称，计划留在澳大利亚的6名女队员因安全原因被立即转移至另一地点，并承诺她们无需为永久居留权打官司，将获得医疗、住房和其他支持。
部分与伊朗准军事革命卫队有关联的队员未获签证。
“有一些人离开澳大利亚，我很高兴她们不再在澳大利亚，”伯克称。
代表团具体人数不详，但官方名单显示26名球员，加上教练和其他工作人员。赛事组织者亚洲足球联合会周三证实，球队已从悉尼飞往马来西亚吉隆坡，入住酒店。
“亚足联将在球队停留期间提供一切必要支持，直至确认后续行程，”声明称，该组织将“继续优先考虑球员和官员的福祉与安全。”
流亡伊朗反对人士、前王储礼萨·巴列维周日称，最初获得庇护的5名球员逃离酒店后被安置在安全地点。
巴列维的办公室在社交媒体发文称，这些“勇敢的运动员”宣布已加入伊朗“国家狮日革命”——指伊朗伊斯兰革命前的国旗——并点名提及她们。
6 of 7 Iranian soccer players granted asylum in Australia stay but rest of team heads home
March 11, 2026 / 6:12 AM EDT / CBS/AP
Gold Coast, Australia — The Iranian women’s soccer team left Australia minus seven of its members who were granted asylum, after tearful protests of their departure at Sydney Airport and frantic final efforts inside the terminal by Australian officials who sought to ensure the women understood they were being offered asylum.
As the team’s flight time drew nearer and they passed through security late Tuesday, each woman was taken aside to meet alone with officials who explained through interpreters that they could choose not to return to Iran.
Members of Iran’s women’s soccer team talk as they arrive on March 11, 2026 at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport after taking part in the AFC Women’s Asian Cup Australia 2026 tournament in Australia, in Sepang. Mohd RASFAN / AFP via Getty Images
Seven other women earlier accepted humanitarian visas allowing them to remain permanently in Australia. Eventually, after what Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke described as “emotional” meetings, no more women accepted the offers of asylum and the team’s flight departed Sydney with all remaining members on board.
The tense and precarious nature of their decisions was underscored Wednesday when Burke announced one of the seven who had stayed behind would return home after all.
“In Australia, people are able to change their mind,” said Burke, who had hours earlier posted photos of the seven women granted humanitarian visas to his social media accounts, their identities clearly visible.
It was a dramatic conclusion to an episode that has gripped Australia since the Iranian team’s first game at the Asian Cup soccer tournament, when they remained silent during their national anthem. The players sang the anthem before subsequent games and haven’t publicly disclosed their views or explained their actions.
Their silence was cast as a gesture of defiance or protest by some, and an act of mourning by others.
“When those players were silent at the start of their first match in Australia, that silence was heard as a roar all around the world,” Burke said. “We responded by saying, the invitation is there. In Australia you can be safe.”
The team arrived in Australia last month, before the Iran war began Feb. 28. Iran was knocked out of the tournament over the weekend and the squad faced the prospect of returning to a country under bombardment.
The women’s fate captured international attention as Iranian Australian groups warned they could face dire consequences from Iran’s theocratic government for failing to sing the anthem, even as the players remained silent on the gesture’s meaning or their own concerns about returning. There was further outrage in Australia on Wednesday after news outlets published a photo that appeared to show a women being led by the wrist by a teammate to the bus bound for the airport, another squad member’s hand at her shoulder.
President Trump waded into the matter Monday, criticizing the Australian government for not offering the women asylum and saying in a post on his Truth Social platform, “The U.S. will take them if you won’t.”
It emerged the next day that discussions between Australian officials and the women had already been unfolding privately.
Meanwhile, an Iranian official rejected suggestions that the women weren’t safe to go home.
“Iran welcomes its children with open arms and the government guarantees their security,” Iranian first Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref said Tuesday. “No one has the right to interfere in the family affairs of the Iranian nation and play the role of a nanny who is kinder than a mother,” he added.
Iranian state TV said the country’s football federation had asked international soccer bodies to review what it called the U.S. president’s “direct political interference in football,” warning such remarks could disrupt the 2026 World Cup.
Australian officials have sought to assure the public that the women were given every opportunity to stay. But as one woman’s decision to return home despite accepting asylum showed, the reality wasn’t so simple.
After days of overtures from officials, Burke said, the efforts to ensure each team member had the chance to consider asylum offers came down to last-minute discussions at Sydney Airport, where the women were separated from their minders and had time to phone their families before deciding whether to leave.
“Everything was about ensuring the dignity for those individuals to make a choice,” he said. “We couldn’t take away the pressure of the context for these individuals, of what might have been said to them beforehand, what pressures they might have felt there were on other family members.”
No further members of the squad decided to remain in Australia before the flight departed, however, and Burke said “exhausted” officials feared they had failed the women.
“As a nation, what mattered was that we could provide the choice,” he said.
On Wednesday, many newspaper front pages bore a photo of the women who had accepted asylum offers under headlines like “Brave new Aussies.” But just hours later, Burke said that one of the women would return to Iran after conversations with her departed teammates.
“Unfortunately, in making that decision she was advised by her teammates and coach to contact the Iranian embassy and to get collected,” he said. “As a result of that, it meant that the Iranian embassy now knew the location of where everybody was.”
The six women planning to remain in Australia were immediately moved to a different location for security reasons, the minister said. He pledged they would not have to fight a legal battle for permanent residency and would receive health, housing and other support in Australia.
Some of the squad, who officials said had connections to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, were not offered visas.
“There were some people leaving Australia who I am glad they’re no longer in Australia,” Burke said.
It wasn’t clear exactly how many people were in the delegation, but an official squad list named 26 players, plus coaching and other staff. The Asian Football Confederation, which organized the tournament, confirmed Wednesday that the squad had traveled from Sydney to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where they were staying in a hotel.
“The AFC will provide all necessary support to the team during their stay until their onward travel arrangements are confirmed,” a statement said, adding that the body would “continue to prioritise the welfare and safety of the players and officials.”
The initial five players granted asylum had been staying in a safe location after fleeing their hotel, Iranian opposition figure and exiled crown prince Reza Pahlavi said Sunday.
The office of Pahlavi, whose father, the Western-backed Shah, was ousted during the Islamic Revolution in 1979, said on social media that the “courageous athletes” announced that “they have joined Iran’s national Lion and Sun Revolution” — a reference to the pre-Islamic Revolution flag of Iran — and naming them in the post.
