Iran: US ban targets ‘grandmothers’

Iran’s foreign minister has denounced the partial reinstatement of President Donald Trump’s travel ban as a “truly shameful exhibition of blind hostility to all Iranians” — and a measure that will prevent Iranian grandmothers from seeing their grandchildren in America.
Friday’s remarks by Mohammad Javad Zarif came after the Trump administration set criteria for visa applicants from the six Muslim-majority nations and all refugees that require a “close” family or business tie to the US.
The guidelines sent to US embassies and consulates initially said applicants must prove a relationship with a parent, spouse, child, adult son or daughter, son-in-law, daughter-in-law or sibling in the US.
Later, the State Department and the Homeland Security Department added “fiancé” to that definition of “close familial relationship” — but not grandparents or grandchildren.
Zarif, who has persistently assailed the travel ban, wrote on his Twitter account that the “US now bans Iranian grandmothers from seeing their grandchildren, in a truly shameful exhibition of blind hostility to all Iranians.”
Experts say the scaled-back version of Trump’s travel ban is likely to generate a new round of court battles.
The new rules took effect Thursday evening but did not spark the protests and chaos at airports around the world that marked the original order last January.

Source: Arab News