Iranian tourist ban doesn’t align with the ‘Australian values’ Hedieh signed up to as a citizen

Iranian-Australian Hedieh Jamshidian at home in Clovelly, Sydney. She is desperately worried about her family in Iran. Photograph: Jessica Hromas/The Guardian

Hedieh Jamshidian feared the window to see her mother, living in Tehran under waves of airstrikes, was closing.

The Australian government had just announced it could block some visa holders from entering the country. So, Jamshidian, a 32-year-old Iranian Australian, decided to act quickly. Within a week she bought her mother, who held a three-month tourist visa, a ticket to Sydney.