🔶 Student Visa Crisis; Students Left in Limbo on the Route to Germany

🔶 Student Visa Crisis; Students Left in Limbo on the Route to Germany

🔻A report by Omid Barin

Temporary closures of the German embassy in Tehran in the wake of regional tensions are not merely an administrative or diplomatic pause; they mark the beginning of a cycle of anxiety, drawn-out uncertainty, and severe economic pressure on applicants for a student visa.

Young people who have battled for months and sometimes years—through the seven trials of learning a language and corresponding with universities to obtain an admission offer—suddenly find themselves in a dark dead end. This unwanted suspension not only delays their academic plans, but also takes hostage their mental peace, motivation, and their outlook for the future.

To better understand these challenges, Deutsche Welle spoke with Mahsa from Shiraz and Mina from Sanandaj, and at the same time sought the response of Germany’s Foreign Ministry.

The suspension of consular services has tied many applicants’ days into a web of ambiguity and unprecedented psychological pressure.

Mahsa, one of the students Deutsche Welle spoke with who is from Shiraz, describes the performance of the embassy’s visa agency company as “bad,” and talks about those tense days: «Of every 400 or 500 times I called, they picked up perhaps only once—just to say they were completely unaware.»

This exhausting uncertainty quickly became intertwined with an economic crisis. A jump in the euro rate from 150 to 250,000 toman has pushed estimates for costs of study migration to the dizzying threshold of four billion tomans; a figure that bears no relation to families’ financial capacity.

Mahsa says the weight of this burden is so great that her 70-year-old father, to encourage her and to make up for the budget shortfall, promises her: «If the embassy gives time, don’t be sad; I’ll sell my car.» In contrast, her mother, who cannot tolerate this level of stress, keeps getting headaches and, with frustration, asks her: «So why did you decide to go?»

The nightmare of costs, however, does not end there. According to her, the shadow of war and fear of sudden border closures caused her to rush to Turkey, very much earlier than planned, just so she would not miss the language test; an emergency and unwanted trip that cost her another 70 million tomans on top of everything.

These anxieties and troubles have led some applicants to consider alternative routes even before the process begins.

Mina, another applicant for a student visa from Sanandaj, tells Deutsche Welle about this: «Even when I think about the embassy’s delays and all the trouble, sometimes it crosses my mind that I should simply give up on applying from Iran and go to another country; bear its costs for six or seven months so at least I can be sure that I can apply for a visa from a second country without worrying.»

Mina, who is still in the stage of preparing for the language test, speaks of the heavy shadow of the name “German embassy” over her plans: «The first thing you hear in Iran is that you can’t get an embassy appointment and that it might take a year and a half. And every time something happens in Iran, the embassy shuts down. Even a sudden change in the visa agency company disrupts our planning and multiplies our anxiety a thousand times.»

Amid all these anxieties, the behavior of the German university is the only encouragement for Mahsa. She explains that the timing of her interview coincides exactly with the night of Israel’s attack on Iran and with severe internet disruption; an event that forces her, under intense stress, to rush to Tehran at night so she can join the online session with a SIM card belonging to one of her acquaintances.

Despite these highly tense circumstances, her German professors assure her that there is no reason for concern. Not only do they extend her registration deadline until the end of September, but the head of the department also writes, sending a warm message: «This was great news; we’re waiting to welcome you.»

📌 Read the full text of the report on the Deutsche Welle Persian website.