He has worked as a correspondent for Sipa Press, Time & Life, Black Star and Newsweek in Iran, as well as for Sipa in Los Angeles and as the AFP correspondent for North Africa and the Middle East. Deghati was director of the AFP photo department for Central America from 1987 to 1991, and for the Middle East from 1991 to 1996. He was named the regional photo manager for The Associated Press Middle East in 2011.
He is founder and director of the AINA Photojournalism Institute in Kabul and was creator and head of the photo unit at UN-OCHA/IRIN, the United Nations humanitarian news agency, based in Nairobi, Kenya. Deghati's work has appeared in such publications as Geo, Paris Match, Le Figaro and National Geographic.
