A YOUNG woman banned from the Iranian chess team — allegedly for not wearing a headscarf at an international competition — has defected to the US, a Tehran news agency reported yesterday.

The semi-official ISNA said that Dorsa Derakhshani refused to wear a hijab during a February competition in Gibraltar and joined the US national team.

But the Mehr agency quoted Mehrdad Pahlevanzadeh, president of Iran’s chess federation, as saying that Sorsa had changed her national federation to the United States, rather than join the national team.