Several Iranian citizens were denied entry into Colombia in recent days after allegedly using false or suspicious identification, Colombian migration officials told newspaper El Tiempo.
The newspaper, citing unnamed sources within Colombia Migration, wrote that there were multiple incidents at different entry points to the country, including Bogotá’s El Dorado International Airport as well as in Cúcuta, a city on the border with Venezuela.
Colombian border authorities, according to the report, didn’t know if the Iranian nationals intended to remain in Colombia, or use it as a transit point to Central America. In total, six Iranian citizens were denied entry for using false or suspicious documents.
The first case was announced on January 9 by Colombia Migration on social media.
“[Colombia Migration] in the [Bogotá El Dorado] airport refused entry to three Iranian citizens coming from Brazil using false Greek passports, who claimed to be en route to Cancún,” according to the agency’s account on X.
The Iranians were then returned to Brazil, according to the intelligence source.
Another case was reported the same week by El Tiempo, citing sources from Colombia Migration.
They write that on January 8, two Iranian citizens were denied entry to the country in Cúcuta, on the Venezuelan border, due to “irregularities in their documents.” Migration officers flagged their movements as suspicious, highlighting unusual recent travel in Central America.
In a separate case in Cúcuta, an Iranian woman was sent back to Venezuela for irregularities surrounding her entry to the country.
She was reportedly stopped while attempting to board a flight to Colombia’s interior with Nicaragua as her final destination.
Migration authorities told El Tiempo that the woman was deported to Venezuela for “failing to comply with current immigration regulations.”
Some media reporting speculated that the citizens were tied to the Iranian government and may have been members of the militant group Hezbollah or the Iranian paramilitary Quds Force.
There is precedent for these theories; in 2021, the then Colombian defense minister told media that security forces had caught two Hezbollah agents who were conspiring to commit a “criminal act.”
But others are less alarmist about the recent cases of forged documents.
Speaking to The Bogotá Post, Katherin Galindo, a Colombian security analyst, explained that many migrants attempt to use the country as a transit zone.
“Colombia is a transit country for so many migrants, legal and illegal, that want to go to the United States, so this is not something new, particularly for Middle Eastern citizens,” said Galindo.
She also downplayed the idea that the attempted entry might constitute a security threat, especially by members of Hezbollah.
“We’re talking about migration and that has to be considered a security issue. [But] if we are talking about national defense, like the possibility of a terrorist attack, well that will be less likely,” she explained.
Instead, Galindo said that the presence of cells of organizations like Hezbollah are more common in countries like Venezuela, where the state has ties to these groups.
This article was originally published on The Bogotá Post.
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