Iran’s former deputy interior minister tries to stop deportation from Canada

A former high-ranking Iranian regime official caught living in Canada has asked a federal judge to halt his deportation, documents obtained by Global News show.

Seyed Salman Samani, who was until recently Iran’s deputy interior minister, claimed in an appeal to the Federal Court that expelling him would violate his rights.

In a court application filed in Toronto, Samani said that on June 19 Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada had denied his request to defer his removal back to Iran.

Calling the decision “unlawfully made” and “patently unreasonable,” the 45-year-old former Iranian government spokesperson asked the court to overturn the ruling.

At the same time, he filed an “anonymity order notice” in which he urged the court to scrub his name from all documents related to his appeal.

Due to the “high-profile nature” of his case, Samani said he wanted to be identified only by “randomized and arbitrary initials” such as A.B. or X.Y.

The court has not yet ruled on the matter.

Samani is one of almost three dozen alleged senior members of Iran’s repressive regime who have been found in Canada, according to figures released by federal immigration officials.

The Immigration and Refugee Board ordered his deportation more than two years ago but his court appeal, filed on Canada Day, shows he has still not been sent home.

The CBSA declined to comment on the case.

Iranian-Canadians have long complained that the country risks becoming a safe haven for members of Iran’s regime, and have called for better screening to weed them out.

The Canadian government banned all “senior” Iranian government officials from entering Canada in 2022, but immigration officials have struggled to deport them.

Of the 34 suspected regime members that the Canada Border Services Agency has identified for possible deportation, only one has been sent back to Iran to date.

Samani is a “career politician” who held a “plethora” of government positions in Iran between 2007 and 2021, according to the CBSA’s report on him.

“The subject demonstrated his commitment and loyalty to the regime throughout his career,” the CBSA wrote in its report, obtained by Global News.

After leaving the Iranian government in August 2021, Samani flew to Canada using a visitor visa issued in Ankara, Turkey.

In 2024, he became one of the first Iranian regime members brought before the Refugee Board for a deportation hearing under the ban on senior officials.

At his hearing, Samani downplayed his importance in the government and denied any involvement in human rights abuses.

But the CBSA said he held “significant influence on the exercise of government power” and was “only two positions removed from the President of Iran.”

As the Ministry of Interior’s official spokesperson, he “served as a conduit for state propaganda, responsible for disseminating information that aligned with the government narrative and suppressing any dissenting views.”

Samani’s department sent agents to attack political protests and was responsible for “frequent violations of speech and assembly rights in Iran,” the CBSA argued.

In his recent court filings, Samani argued that Canadians should not be permitted to know about his case.

He wrote that he had a “considerable profile as a former member of the Iranian government, which has gathered substantial media attention.”

If his case were heard in public, he might face “possible retribution from Iranian authorities,” he claimed.

Although Canada’s courts are open to the public, the Federal Court allows applicants to ask to have their cases anonymized, meaning they are not identified by name, but that is done rarely.

Samani also tried to ban the press from his deportation hearing in 2024. Global News fought the move and the Refugee Board ruled it would be held in public.

Another alleged regime member, Abbas Omidi, tried to ban news reporters from his deportation hearing as well, but the IRB ruled in March that such cases were in the public interest.

“For all Canadians, I find that transparency regarding the type of allegation Mr. Omidi is facing is an important safeguard that enables accountability, deters impunity, and reinforces public confidence in Canadian legal processes and institutions,” the Board wrote.

“In this context, hiding Mr. Omidi’s identity would have a strong deleterious/negative effect on the public’s interest in the open court process.”

Canada has had tense relations with Iran since the country’s 1979 Islamic revolution. Ottawa severed diplomatic ties with Tehran in 2012, citing the regime’s nuclear program and support for terrorist groups.

More recently, the government’s threat assessment agency said in a declassified report that the regime’s intelligence service may be linked to attacks in Canada since the start of the Iran war.

Stewart.Bell@globalnews.ca