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Last week, in front of a global audience, the Iranian women’s footballers stood silently as their national anthem played. It was a wordless act of defiance that may make it impossible for them to go home. Within hours, Iranian state TV accused the players of dishonour and betrayal, declaring that “traitors during wartime must be dealt with”.
The choice to remain silent on the pitch was theirs. The decision as to what happens next should be, too. But this can only happen if Australian authorities and the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) do what they are each bound to do: ensure that every one of these players can speak freely, get independent legal advice, and make an informed choice about their future without a regime-connected official in the room.
Despite a worldwide outpouring of concern for their welfare, the players and team staff face significant barriers to seeking assistance or protection while in Australia. Reports indicate the team is under intense surveillance, with potential retribution not only for themselves but also for their families back home.
The level of control reported severely restricts the players’ freedom to make confidential inquiries about asylum, legal protections, or support services. In short, while the women are physically present in this country they are not free to exercise their rights or seek Australia’s assistance.
An online petition from the Australian Iranian Council has gathered more than 64,000 signatures urging the government to ensure the players are not forced to depart without independent legal advice, interpreters and trauma-informed support.
Threats to players and their family members to compel their return may constitute a criminal offence under Australian law, which should be investigated by the Australian Federal Police (AFP). Under federal laws it is an offence to organise or facilitate the exit of a person from Australia using coercion, threat or deception to obtain their compliance – punishable by up to 12 years’ imprisonment.
Exit trafficking convictions in Australia remain rare, but reports to the AFP have more than doubled in recent years, making it one of the fasted-growing forms of human trafficking. Those prosecuted have typically been family members using coercion or deception to force women or children out of Australia against their will. But the offence is not limited to domestic settings and what is being alleged here is something more organised and more deliberate.
If regime-connected actors are using threats against players’ family members to pressure players to board a flight home, the AFP’s specialist human trafficking team has not only the power but the obligation to investigate. Australia also has a system for supporting victims of trafficking, including access to accommodation, legal services and other supports.
While the AFC cannot itself grant protection to the Iranian players, its human rights obligations under its own statutes and FIFA’s Human Rights Policy require it to take proactive steps to prevent harm. This should include ensuring the team has unimpeded access to independent legal advice, freedom from surveillance or coercion by state officials, and a safe environment in which any player who wishes to seek assistance from Australia can do so without interference.
Australia is a signatory to the 1951 Convention relating to the Status Of Refugees. Obligations under the Convention are clear: any person on Australian territory who fears persecution in their home country may seek the protection of the Australian state. To be granted protection in Australia, the Iranian players would need to demonstrate a real chance of persecution if returned to Iran, for reasons including political opinion. If they cannot satisfy the Refugee Convention criteria, they may still qualify for complementary protection if they face a real risk of significant harm, including torture, cruel or degrading treatment, or arbitrary deprivation of life.
Given the credible and publicised risks these players face, including criticism, surveillance, and threats of severe punishment if they return, they would appear to fall squarely within the people this framework was designed to protect.
That said, no outcome is automatic. Each applicant would be assessed individually by the Department of Home Affairs, with each player’s circumstances, the nature of the threats against her, and the credibility of the risks she faces evaluated through the same process applied to all protection claims. In the meantime, there is a more immediate obligation: ensuring that these women can actually access that process in the first place.
International law dictates that Australia cannot send a person back to a place where their life or freedom would be threatened. Australia cannot discharge that obligation, nor its separate duty to prevent human trafficking, by simply by looking the other way while players are shepherded through departures.
Every player must be seen privately, informed of her rights, and given genuine access to independent legal advice, free from surveillance and free from coercion.
At this moment, both Australia and the AFC are being tested, not just on the pitch, but on whether they will protect the basic rights of athletes who have already shown immense courage.
The cruellest dimension of this situation is that some players may choose to return, not because they want to, but because they fear what refusal will mean for their families at home. Australia cannot protect people from that calculus. But it can guarantee that no woman boards that flight without having first been told, in private and without interference, what her rights are and what protection is available. That is not a political ask. It is a legal one, and it is the very least these women deserve.
Dr Mary Anne Kenny is an associate professor in the School of Law and Criminology, Murdoch University. Professor Daniel Ghezelbash is the director of the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW.
Professor Daniel Ghezelbash is the director of the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW.
Dr Mary Anne Kenny is an associate professor in the School of Law and Criminology, Murdoch University.From our partners
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