The New York Times, citing informed sources, reported on Monday, September 4th, that Johan Floderus, a 33-year-old Swedish national and employee of the European Union, has been detained in Iran for over 500 days. He traveled to Iran in spring last year for a personal tourist trip along with several fellow countrymen. On April 17, when he was trying to leave Iran, he was arrested at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Airport.
The Iranian regime had announced the arrest of a Swedish citizen on charges of “spying” in July of last year.
Johan Floderus, who is currently held in Evin Prison, has a background of holding several positions within EU-related institutions. He has also appeared in a promotional campaign aimed at attracting Swedish youth to EU careers.
The New York Times spoke to six people with firsthand knowledge of the case. All requested anonymity, fearing a backlash for speaking about it. They denied that Mr. Floderus had been involved in espionage.
While refraining from commenting on the details of the incident, the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated in an email correspondence with the New York Times: ” A Swedish citizen — a man in his 30s — was detained in Iran in April 2022. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the Embassy of Sweden in Tehran are working on the case intensively.”
The Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs added, “We understand that there is interest in this matter, but in our assessment, it would complicate the handling of the case if the ministry were to publicly discuss its actions.”
Since 2019, Mr. Floderus has been an assistant to Ylva Johansson, the European Commissioner for Home Affairs. In 2021, he also joined the European External Action Service, which combines the foreign affairs and defense departments of the European Union and is currently led by Josep Borrell.
Informed sources told the New York Times that this Swedish citizen had previously visited Iran without any problems as part of a European Union development program.
The report by the Islamic Republic last year also referred to Mr. Floderus’ previous trips to Iran as a reason for his “sinister activities.”
The European External Action Service stated that it is “closely following the case of a detained Swedish citizen in Iran,” but did not mention whether Mr. Floderus works for this institution or if he had previously traveled to Iran for EU-related matters.
Nabila Massrali, a spokesperson for the European External Action Service, said, “We have used every opportunity to raise this issue with Iranian authorities in order to secure the voluntary release of all arbitrarily detained EU citizens and will continue to do so.”
Mr. Floderus’s father has refrained from commenting on his son’s situation.
Relations between Iran and Sweden are very cold. In July of last year, a court in Sweden sentenced Hamid Nouri, a former judicial official of the Iranian regime, to life imprisonment for his involvement in the massacre of political prisoners in 1988.
Hamid Nouri, a former judicial official of the Iranian regime
One month after Mr. Floderus’s arrest, the Islamic Republic issued a death sentence for Ahmad Reza Djalali, an Iranian-Swedish researcher, on fabricated and baseless charges such as “espionage” and “assisting in the assassination of nuclear scientists by Israel.”
In the same month, the regime executed Habib Asiod, an Iranian-Swedish citizen who had been abducted from Turkey in 2020.
Habib Asiod
The non-disclosure of the arrest of this 33-year-old Swedish diplomat by Swedish and EU authorities comes at a time when Western officials have repeatedly accused the regime of engaging in “hostage diplomacy” to gain political leverage.
In recent years, the Iranian regime has detained dual and foreign nationals on fabricated charges in pursuit of exchanging them for its arrested agents in Europe and the United States, or to use them as leverage to gain money and other benefits.
Last month, the United States agreed to release $6 billion of Iran’s blocked assets in South Korea in exchange for the freedom of five of its detained citizens in Iran.
In May Belgium released Tehran’s convicted terrorist diplomat, Assadollah Assadi. Assadi was convicted for organizing and commanding a terrorist attack targeting a NCRI rally near Paris back in 2018, later described as the biggest criminal act in Europe after World War II.
Assadollah Assadi, terrorist diplomat,
It is not unlikely that the Swedish government, after 500 days of silence, is seeking the release of Hamid Nouri and exchanging him for its own hostage.
Recently a US State Department official met with the family of an Iranian-German dual national, signaling a possible expansion of ongoing American efforts to secure the release of hostages from the Iranian regime. The meeting was preceded by weeks of international discussion and debate over a prisoner exchange agreement that is currently pending, which could see five American citizens released from Iranian custody in exchange for at least four Iranian plus six billion dollars’ worth of Iranian financial assets that have been frozen in South Korea.
Various enemies of the Iranian regime and critics of US policy toward that regime have voiced opposition to that agreement in its current form, with many arguing that the financial component comprises a “ransom” payment that could help to finance more malign activities by the Iranian regime, including crackdowns on dissent which have accelerated in the wake of that nationwide uprising sparked last year by Mahsa Amini’s death at the hands of “morality police.”
Other critics have taken issue with the perceived exclusion of certain hostages, including Jamshid Sharmahd, whose family has lobbied for greater attention from the White House and finally secured a meeting with Abram Paley, a deputy special envoy for Iran, on Friday. Apart from holding citizenship in Iran and Germany, Sharmahd is a permanent US resident and had been residing there for many years before being kidnapped by Iranian operatives during a layover in Dubai and taken back to the Islamic Republic to face trial for several terrorist acts attributed to an organization with which he has had prior involvement.
The trial concluded in February with a death sentence, but was described by Amnesty International as “grossly unfair.” State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel affirmed this description in an August 14 briefing, calling the legal proceeding a “sham trial.” This no doubt raised existing expectations that Washington would become directly involved in efforts to secure Sharmahd’s release, and perhaps also the release of other people imprisoned in Iran who have meaningful connections with the US falling short of citizenship.
In this respect, Sharmahd’s situation is similar to that of Shahab Dalili, who was arrested after returning to his native Iran for his father’s funeral in 2016, and was ultimately sentenced to 10 years based on vague allegations of spying for Tehran’s “enemies”. According to his son, Dalili had been planning to apply for American citizenship, having lived there for years prior to his trip. The interruption to this plan may have resulted in Dalili being perceived as a lower priority in discussions of possible prisoner swaps, but according to some of the aforementioned critics, it shouldn’t have.
Richard Ractliffe, the husband Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, an Iranian-British charity coordinator who was held hostage in the Islamic Republic between 2016 and 2022, expressed this view in remarks that were published by the Guardian on Sunday. Evidently not satisfied by any explanation that relies upon the difference in their citizenship status, Ratcliffe said that Dalili and Sharmahd were at risk of being left behind for “opaque reasons,” and noted that the State Department has so far declined to formally label the two men as “wrongfully detained,” though it has the power to do so.
Ratcliffe emphasized that in absence of that status, Sharmahd’s connections to the West would not protect him from having his death sentence carried out, and might even make him a more appealing target for Iranian hardliners. Noting that at least two foreign nationals have been killed by the Iranian judiciary in the past year, he concluded that “we have seen Iran expand its hostage diplomacy into execution diplomacy.”
Ratcliffe also called attention to the conspicuous timing of the tentative US-Iran prisoner exchange deal, coming just ahead of the mid-September anniversary of the latest nationwide uprising. He said: “This deal is clearly part of an Iranian government plan to manage the anniversary headlines, along with a new round of mass arrests. Why the US government has gone along with that timing, I don’t know.”
Meanwhile, Sharmahd’s daughter Gazelle argued that negotiations to finalize that agreement should only proceed if it looks like they will lead to the release of all known hostages with intimate ties to the US. Using the hashtag “#LeaveNoOneBehind in a post on Twitter, or X, following her meeting with Paley, she expressed commitment to working with the administration of US President Joe Biden to develop a plan for securing that outcome.
For his part, Paley affirmed on the same social media platform that Jamshid Sharmahd “should have never been detained in Iran” and that the White House hoped to see him quickly reunited with his loved ones. This and the underlying discussion of a broader exchange plan seem to have elicited a response from Tehran, though it was not immediately clear whether the intention was to dismiss American involvement in Sharmahd’s case or to frame it as an opportunity to Iranian authorities to also pursue broader aims.
On Monday, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani called upon the US government to “explain” its connections to Sharmahd. On its own, the request could reinforce Tehran’s longstanding tendency to blame both domestic terrorism and peaceful dissent as the product of interference by Western intelligence agencies. But depending on the American response, or perceived response, the inquiry could also help to clarify the potential value to the US of the hostage in question.
Officially, Tehran does not recognize dual nationality and in cases like Sharmahd’s and Dalali’s, it generally denies access to consular assistance from their adoptive home countries, insisting that the detainees are Iranian only and that their trial and punishment are purely domestic matters. To the extent that Kanaani was genuinely inquiring about Sharmahd’s ties to the US, it is possible that the State Department was signaling willingness to discuss his case at the diplomatic level. But if this were the case, such discussions would almost certainly lead to new demands on the Iranian side.
Questions were raised about what those demands might entail later on Monday, when Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian claimed that there are no other Iranian assets frozen in any country, apart from the six billion that is due to be released from South Korea if and when the prisoner swap agreement goes into effect. This claim was reiterated by President Ebrahim Raisi in a televised press conference the following day, albeit not before he seemed to contradict the claim by urging the government of Japan to assert its independence from the United States by releasing Iranian funds.
Regardless of whether the Foreign Minister’s claim was actually true, its public assertion could be meant to highlight expectations that Tehran will be able to secure other sorts of concessions through future diplomatic negotiations, including negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program as well as the various dual and foreign nationals who will remain in Iranian custody after the pending agreement goes into effect.
Tehran’s insistence that it can currently access all money earned through foreign transactions is also indicative of the regime’s commitment to promoting a narrative of the “failure” of US-led economic sanctions. That narrative was no doubt encouraged last week when it was reported that Iran would be among six nations to formally join the coalition of developing nations known as BRICS at the start of next year.
Indeed, Ali Akbar Velayati, a close advisor to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, was quoted on Tuesday by Mehr News Agency as saying that Iran’s inclusion in the Chinese-led organization “has thwarted the United States policy of isolating Tehran.” Separately, Mehr appeared to suggest that the same development would help to accelerate the development of a trade route linking Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey, which the outlet said would be a “game-changer” for Iran’s economy and for international challenges to the existing world order.
Of course, Iran has sought to present itself as the central figure in those challenges, not just through “economic diplomacy” but also through mounting military threats, in cooperation with its BRICS partners, among others.
In Monday’s press conference, Kanaani boasted that the naval forces of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps would soon be outfitted with new submarines, then proceeded to demand an end to the “illegal presence of the US in Syria.” A day later, Iranian state media claimed that Iran had put into production a new air defense system called “Tactical Sayyad,” which is supposedly capable of intercepting 12 targets at once. On Wednesday, Brigadier General Alireza Sabahifard, commander of the Iranian Army’s Air Defense Force, reiterated this claim and described Iran’s overall air defenses as “world class.”
Developments in this area surely owe much to Iran’s growing partnership with Russia, which famously initiated plans to sell Iran an advanced S-300 missile defense system almost immediately after the implementation of a nuclear agreement between Iran and six world powers in 2016. With that agreement having been on life support since the US withdrew from it in 2018, Iranian-Russian military cooperation has only grown more extensive, with both participants often praising that cooperation in terms of its impact on Western supremacy around the globe.
Recently the US reportedly pushed for an end to the sale of Iranian drones to Russia for use in the war on Ukraine, only to be publicly rebuffed from the Russian side: “There are no changes, and cooperation with Iran will continue,” said Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov. “We are independent states and do not succumb to the dictates of the United States and its satellites.”
In its latest report, the Majlis Research Center has announced a 61% growth in the government and state-owned companies’ debt in 2022 compared to September 2023.
According to the report, published on September 3, the government’s debt has reached 12,480 trillion rials (approximately $24.960 billion) with a 30% growth during the mentioned period, while the debt of state-owned companies has peaked at 18,910 trillion rials (approximately $37.820 billion) with a 90% growth.
The total debt of the government and state-owned companies was estimated to be around 31,380 trillion rials (approximately $62.760 billion) by the end of the previous year, equivalent to approximately 29% of Iran’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
However, the report specifies that there are discrepancies and unregistered items in the national treasury regarding certain claims by creditors. If these figures are taken into account, the debt-to-GDP ratio would increase.
The release of the recent report on the government’s debt by the Research Center comes while regime Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei recently praised the performance of President Ebrahim Raisi’s government on August 30, claiming that “a significant number of macroeconomic indicators indicate growth and progress.”
The International Monetary Fund has assessed Iran’s government debt-to-GDP ratio at around 34% or $120 billion for 2022.
The IMF report, published in May, indicates that Iran’s government debt has surged from $49 billion to $120 billion over the past two years, effectively doubling from 2020 to 2022.
This spike in government debt comes at a time when the regime’s president, Ebrahim Raisi promised to control government borrowing during the presidential election and curb inflation by controlling liquidity.
He has also recently claimed that “all economic indicators of the country are on a growth path,” while recent statistics show that the government’s debt has exceeded 31 trillion rials (approximately $62 billion).
In recent years, various governments, due to overestimation of oil revenues in the budget and their non-realization, have been forced to extensively borrow from financial institutions, including the Central Bank and other banks, the National Development Fund, and so on.
Mehdi Ghazanfari, the head of Iran’s National Development Fund, said in May that 67% of the $150 billion resources of the National Development Fund have been withdrawn by governments.
The Majlis Research Center had also reported in August that the average monthly withdrawal of governments from the National Development Fund during Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s presidency was around $453 million, during Hassan Rouhani’s presidency it was $700 million, and during Ebrahim Raisi’s presidency, it reached $1.1 billion.
As a result of such extensive and escalating borrowing, the government has forced the Central Bank to print unsupported banknotes, leading to a surge in liquidity and, consequently, soaring inflation in the country.
According to the World Bank’s estimate, Iran’s inflation rate was 49% last year, and the price growth of food items in Iran has the highest rate in the world after Venezuela, Lebanon, Zimbabwe, and Argentina.
At the cusp of the reopening of universities and on the anniversary of the 2022 nationwide uprising, Iran’s regime has intensified its attacks on the university from different directions. On the one hand, the regime is dismissing “critical” professors and replacing them with aligned elements, or as one academician put it, “artificial injection of fake professors.” On the other hand, Iranian authorities have engaged in the expulsion of many students from universities and filling the vacancies with regime loyalists.
In response to the wave of protests regarding the expulsion of certain critical professors, Mohammad Moghimi, the president of the University of Tehran denied any “expulsion” of professors from the university and simultaneously claimed that some professors have been prevented from working due to “ethical problems and complaints.”
In an interview with the state-run ILNA news agency, published on September 3, Moghimi said that if educational groups at the University of Tehran decide that they do not need the teaching services of a professor, “then the claim of the individual seeking expulsion from the university would be very ridiculous.”
“I am fully aware that the continuation of collaboration with some of these individuals has been prevented due to ethical problems and complaints, but they claim in the media that their collaboration was terminated due to political issues,” Moghimi added.
He did not clarify whether this “complainer” is private or governmental. Additionally, the Iranian regime has used these absurd accusations in numerous cases to silence its critics.
The contradictory claims of the president of the University of Tehran, denying any “expulsion,” are published one day after the Ministry of Science’s spokesperson confirmed the expulsion of professors. Last week, student guild councils also reported the “removal” of seven professors from the Faculty of Literature at the University of Tehran.
The student guild council added that their “removal” from the Faculty of Literature at the University of Tehran was carried out “not in a legal and officially communicated manner, but without prior notice and due to manipulation in course allocation.”
Meanwhile, the regime’s Etemad newspaper, also confirmed the expulsion of these professors in a report last Friday and wrote that the recent wave of expulsions of university students dates back to the beginning of Ebrahim Raisi‘s presidency.
In response to the Etemad report, Ali Shamsipour, the spokesperson of the Ministry of Science, also confirmed the “expulsion” or “suspension” of 58 professors from universities during Raisi’s government. He stated that three of these professors have cases in the judiciary, and seven of them had engaged in “criminal activities” during last year’s nationwide protests.
This official added that out of the total of 58 professors who have been “expelled” or “suspended,” three professors belong to medical universities under the supervision of the Ministry of Health and have no connection to the Ministry of Science. Additionally, 17 of the expelled professors are from private universities and they themselves should be accountable in this regard.
University of Tehran President: No Professors Expelled
In this regard, the President of the University of Tehran claimed in an interview with the semiofficial ILNA news agency, “During my two-year tenure as the university’s manager, we have not had a single case of professor expulsion.”
Moghimi referred to the expelled professors’ self-removal from the university as the “peak of immorality” and accused foreign Persian-language media of spreading these reports, stating that such reports are only raised by “opposition networks and opportunistic individuals.”
In his interview, the President of the University of Tehran repeatedly used the term “expulsion” and did not provide any explanation regarding the “removal, termination of collaboration, or forced retirement” of university professors.
However, Moghimi confirmed the suspension of professors at the University of Tehran but stated that there are only two of them, and their cases have been referred to judicial authorities, and they are currently under suspension until a judicial verdict is issued.
He denied the expulsion of professors from the University of Tehran, just as he had previously denied attempts to suppress protesting students.
In the previous month, the student guild councils considered the admission of members of the Iraqi paramilitary group Hashd al-Shaabi at the University of Tehran as an attempt to suppress the students. However, the President of the University of Tehran described the statement of student activists as “deviant and simplistic.”
The recent wave of expelling university professors in Iran comes at a time when the suppression of Iranian students has continued for months, and many students have faced heavy disciplinary fines and imprisonment due to their participation in nationwide protests.
During last year’s nationwide protests, Iranian universities, including the University of Tehran, were among the main centers of the protests.
On August 28, state-run Etemad newspaper reported that after “great purge of professors,” the regime is trying to change the rules of admission of students to universities “based on political-religious qualifications.” The important tool this year for executing this process will be through the disciplinary committees of the universities. In the next years, different quotas will be applied to the entry of students to universities by evaluation organization after this institution is transferred to the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution.
While regime is seeing its power diminish, by putting the blade on the university’s throat, it will deepen its isolation in the society. This is the inevitable path for medieval regime, which sees its existence in conflict with the university. Regime founder Ruhollah Khomeini confirmed this in his hateful statements against the university after the 1979 revolution. Therefore, against the explosive state of the society and the growing revolutionary resistance, such measures will do the regime no service.
In Noshahr Prison, the reported death of Javad Rouhi, an imprisoned activist, has raised concerns and suspicions about the treatment of detainees within the Iranian regime. The regime’s judiciary announced the demise of Rouhi, who had been held in the prison, citing medical complications as the cause.
According to the regime-affiliated Mizan News Agency, the prison authorities stated that Javad Rouhi, a lawfully incarcerated inmate, was transferred to Shahid Beheshti Hospital in Noshahr on Thursday, August 31, at 3:45 AM due to experiencing convulsions. Despite medical efforts, he unfortunately did not survive. The authorities have sent his body to the forensic medicine department for a thorough autopsy and toxicological examinations. It is worth noting that Rouhi had previously been sentenced to execution by the Sari Court, and his case was still under review at the time of his death.
The alleged killing of prisoners involved in the uprising through means such as torture, poisoning, or other forms of annihilation has become all too common within the regime. Tragically, a significant number of prisoners have met their untimely demise in prisons or even after their release.
Javad Rouhi, a 35-year-old resident of Amol, was arrested in November 2022 and reportedly subjected to brutal torture during his time in the IRGC Prison. The severity of the torture was such that he lost his ability to speak. He had been sentenced to execution three times on unfounded charges of “spreading corruption on earth” and “waging war against God.” However, due to both domestic and international protests, the regime was unable to carry out the sentence. On January 10, 2023, the regime’s judiciary stated that Javad Rouhi had allegedly led a group of agitators and individuals in inciting and encouraging citizens to engage in turmoil.
The killing of prisoners of the uprising under torture, poisoning, or other means is routine occurrence in the regime’s prisons. Many prisoners died in this manner both within prisons and after their release.
Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), emphasized that the regime, in its fear of uprisings and downfall, has extended its suppression and repression to all prisons, universities, and the families of prisoners and martyrs. She called on the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and all international authorities to condemn the crimes of the regime against prisoners and to investigate the circumstances of Javad Rouhi’s death. Mrs. Rajavi urged all Iranian youth to protest against the crimes of this regime, especially against the prisoners of the uprising and political prisoners.
Following Rouhi’s death, the regime buried his body secretly in a village in the vicinity of Amol under severe security measures.
Amnesty also reiterated that Rouhi was subjected to a flawed judicial process, including denial of access to an independent lawyer of his own choosing.
“All those reasonably suspected of responsibility for crimes under international law against Javad Rouhi must be criminally investigated and held to account in fair proceedings,” Amnesty wrote.
Today’s death in custody of 31-year-old arbitrarily detained protester Javad Rouhi again exposes the Iranian authorities’ abhorrent assault on the right to life amid an ongoing human rights crisis and must be effectively and independently investigated. 1/15 pic.twitter.com/al0jnFGyIS
The Iranian people are suffering from an electricity crisis. The electricity crisis is rooted in the Iranian regime’s strategy. Instead of solving these problems, this regime spends all of Iran’s resources on terrorism and nuclear ambitions and does not care about the fate of the Iranian people.
Iran’s vast assets are in the hands of a regime whose goals and desires are to safeguard its rule by all means.
Iran’s wounds and problems have remained open and are continuously deepening for years now.
Research conducted by Iran’s open data platforms indicates that this year many provinces in Iran have experienced “gas cuts, followed by power cuts”.
The results of this research show that “the supply of natural gas to factories and petrochemical plants has been cut off, and Iran is unable to achieve its petrochemical production goals.”
According to this report, in recent months, the Iranian government has declared nationwide emergency holidays due to “extremely hot weather,” but many experts believe that these holidays are due to electricity shortages.
Electricity Crisis
Iran’s open data platform explains why Iran, which was contemplating exporting its surplus electricity 20 years ago, is now facing a severe electricity crisis.
Insufficient rainfall
According to this platform, one of the reasons for this crisis is the lack of rainfall in recent years, while “20% of Iran’s electricity is supplied through hydroelectric power plants.”
Lack of investment in other renewable energy sources
Iran has not invested in other renewable energy sources such as solar and wind. The Iranian open data platform previously explained in an article that “the United Arab Emirates, which does not have a dam for electricity generation, has three times the capacity for renewable energy production compared to Iran.”
Investment in nuclear power plants
Instead of investing in renewable energy sources, Iran has invested “billions of dollars in its nuclear power plants, which have also been subject to major sanctions against the country. However, currently only 1-2% of Iran’s electricity is generated by nuclear energy.”
Gas Crisis
Examinations by open data platform indicate that Iran has been heavily reliant on gas imports from Turkmenistan for many years to meet the gas needs in the northeastern provinces of Khorasan and Golestan. However, Iran has not paid its bills on time, and Turkmenistan has filed a legal case against Iran.
This report states that in recent weeks, Iran has claimed that Turkmenistan will resume its gas supply, “however the exact rate and duration of the gas supply in the winter months are still unknown.”
Iran’s open data platform states that one of Iran’s major achievements, which the government has boasted about for 20 years, is the replacement of fuel-powered plants with gas-powered plants. However, “in recent years, with the reduction in gas supply, the government has resorted to burning mazut in its power plants, leading to serious air pollution.”
Examinations by Iran’s open data platform reveal that the “most striking reason for the electricity shortage is the rapid depletion of reserves in the South Pars gas field. Iran’s gas reserves account for approximately 17% of the world’s total gas reserves and are ten times larger than Europe’s total gas reserves.”
South Pars alone accounts for about 30% of Iran’s total gas reserves, however 70% of Iran’s gas supply comes from the South Pars gas field. Therefore, any production issues in South Pars can lead to a severe gas reduction in Iran.
South Pars began its production about 30 years ago.
Experts describe the gas shortage in Iran as a “structural and highly complex problem.”
Examinations indicate that “Iran made significant investments in the development of the South Pars gas field 20 to 30 years ago but has neglected it in recent years. It is likely that in the near future, the problem of gas shortages in winter, and consequently power outages, will worsen.”
The Iranian regime, under the pretext of resolving the electricity crisis, proceeded to build a nuclear power plant, which not only failed to solve this problem but also resulted in the loss of a significant amount of capital from the Iranian people.
The cost of Iran’s nuclear activities is as ambiguous as its background. The discrepancies and differences between the figures and statistics announced by regime officials are so great that sometimes the difference in figures reaches several billion dollars.
Mohammad Saeedi, a former deputy head of the regime’s Atomic Energy Organization, estimated the cost of Iran’s nuclear program at less than $2 billion.
The construction of this power plant has taken about 36 years and its second and third phases have not been put into operation yet.
On June 30, the UAE announced that it has launched its 1,177-MW Noor Abu Dhabi solar power plant. This is the world’s largest solar power plant and was built in two years at a cost of $870 million.
The official website of the UAE National Water and Electricity Company announced that the power plant has been commissioned with the installation of 3.2 million solar panels in eight square kilometers of land.
According to a report by the state-run ILNA news agency, on August 27, during the two years of Ebrahim Raisi’s presidency, a minimum of 250% inflation has been imposed on the people’s livelihoods, and workers’ wages are one-third of the poverty line.
The news agency criticized the Deputy Minister of Cooperatives, Labor and Social Welfare for claiming otherwise and wrote that despite inflation in essential goods and the wage gap with the poverty line, officials consider an 87% increase in wages over two years as an “achievement.”
ILNA also reported that the “three worker members of the Supreme Labor Council” have requested the council to convene a session and reconsider the minimum monthly wage of workers. It criticized Ali Hossein Ra’eeti Fard for his firm statement that “wages will not be adjusted.”
The Labor Relations Deputy of the Ministry of Cooperatives, Labor, and Social Welfare has categorically rejected the wage increase for workers, while the “three worker members of the Supreme Labor Council” claim that the promises of the government ministers were to control inflation and increase the minimum wage for workers if inflation is not controlled.
In his remarks, Ali Hossein Ra’eeti Fard announced the poverty line for 2023 as 130 million rials (approximately $260), but this is in a situation where in the meetings of the Supreme Labor Council in the previous year, the proposed figure by the three worker members of the council for the cost of living or the poverty line was more than 180 million rials (approximately $360). At the same time, independent labor organizations demanded a wage of more than 200 million rials (approximately $400) for workers.
At that time, at the time of determining the wages for 2023, the calculations of the wage committee of the Supreme Association of Councils and the opinions of members of Majlis (parliament) indicated that the poverty line had exceeded 220 million rials (approximately $440).
ILNA wrote that today, the minimum poverty line in Tehran is 300 million rials (approximately $600), and in other cities, it is at least 230 million rials (approximately $460). Considering these figures, which are calculated as the bare minimum for an average household of 3.3 people, the minimum wage and benefits of 90 million rials (approximately $180) do not even cover one-third of the poverty line. In other words, even with a 33% wage, the poverty line is not covered.
The published statistics and figures regarding the prices of food items in the past two years show that a minimum of 250% inflation has been imposed on the people’s livelihoods.
However, Sowlat Mortazavi, the Minister of Cooperatives, Labor, and Social Welfare, in response to the renewed request for wage adjustment, stated that the members of the Supreme Labor Council can request a review of the minimum wages of workers, and if requested, it will be put on the agenda.
Earlier, Mortazavi had rejected any promises to revise workers’ wages, and the Administrative Justice Court also announced the dismissal of workers’ complaints, stating that the wages for 2023 were determined based on the law and not subject to workers’ complaints.
Olya Ali Beigi, the head of the Islamic Labor Council, has referred to the request of the workers’ community for a review of wages and stated that they expect the Supreme Labor Council and the government’s economic team to consider the concerns and livelihood issues of the workers.
Ali Beigi criticized the ongoing inflation in the country and pointed out the workers’ livelihood crisis, stating that workers’ wages do not even cover the expenses of 10 days of living.
These living conditions and the statements of labor activists come at a time when the Deputy Minister of Labor claims that workers’ wages have been fairly determined and no amendments will be made.
“The restoration of wages” was a promise made by the Minister of Labor during the determination of the wage increase, but Sowlat Mortazavi, after the workers’ request, rejected any promises to review wages.
Iran’s Ham-Mihan newspaper reported on August 27 that an “unprecedented event” has caused 60 percent of Iran’s territory to be affected by var ious intensities of dust and particulate matter.
Following the onslaught of dust and particulate matter in some areas of northern and northeastern Iran, which began on Friday, August 26, some regime’s officials stated that the source was the Turkmenistan Desert. However, some experts refute this and attribute the cause to the drying up of internal wetlands.
In recent days, domestic outlets and social media users have shared images of the dust storms impact in the eastern part of Mazandaran province, northern Iran, Gorgan, and northern regions of Khorasan province. Some residents have described this phenomenon as “unprecedented” in these areas, while others have likened it to the dust storms in Sistan and Baluchestan province.
The Director General of Meteorology in Golestan province in northern Iran announced the source of the dust storm as the Turkmenistan Desert, stating that the cities of Bandar Turkmen, Bandar Gaz, Gorgan, and some parts of the northern regions have been affected by this phenomenon.
Ali Mohammad Tahmasbi-Birgani, an advisor to the head of the Environmental Protection Organization and the secretary of the National Dust Storm Committee, also declared Turkmenistan as the origin of the current dust storms in an interview with Ham-Mihan on Monday. He added that simultaneously, another dust mass with Semnan province as its origin has formed in this province and the provinces of Qom and southern Tehran. Additionally, another dust mass from Iraq has affected parts of the southwest such as Dasht-e Azadegan, Shush, and some areas of Ilam province.
This situation is different from the widespread dust storms that affected Sistan and Baluchestan province and some parts of Khorasan in recent weeks.
Nevertheless, many environmental experts and activists attribute the main cause of dust and particulate matter phenomena in Iran to the drying up of lakes and internal wetlands, as well as neighboring countries. In recent years, this has become one of the serious environmental crises in Iran.
Mohammad Darvish, an environmental activist, stated, “Various factors contribute to the intensification of dust storms, including the alteration of natural river routes, which leads to the desiccation of riverbeds, often consisting of wetland environments and desert lakes, becoming sources of dust and soil particles.”
In addition to the drying of Lake Urmia and the warning of its transformation into a “large swamp” by mid-August of this year, environmental activist Mohammad Kohansal had previously warned that if the continued “overflow of urban sewage” and “sediments resulting from extensive deforestation in previous years” persist, Anzali Lagoon, one of the largest lagoons in the Middle East, will turn into a separate and shallow pond within the next five years.
Meanwhile, besides reports of critical conditions in Gavkhouni Wetland in Isfahan, central Iran, and Hoor al-Azim Wetland in southwestern Khuzestan, smaller wetlands are also suffering. The Director General of Environmental Protection in Kermanshah, located in western Iran, had stated on August 20 that Hashilan Wetland in this province will completely dry up in a few days.
Furthermore, the alarm bell of Lake Caspian shrinking and the exacerbation of this situation with a decrease in water inflows in the future has also been sounded.
The issue of drying lakes and wetlands in Iran in recent years has become one of the serious environmental crises in the country.
The officials and authorities of the regime frequently attribute the origin of dust pollution to external factors and neighboring countries in their response to the alarming alerts regarding soil erosion and the environmental consequences of lake and wetland desiccation.
However, environmental experts and activists believe that the existing crises in the country are the result of mismanagement.
Abbas Mohammadi, an environmental activist, says, “The environmental problems in our country are more serious than simply assigning the issues to external factors and deflecting responsibility.”
This expert considers the major cause of dust storms and particulate matter that affect all corners of the country as “poor governance” and further adds, “Both in domestic politics and foreign policy, we have engaged ourselves in matters and issues that are not primarily national and fundamentally beyond our capacity and willpower to solve.”
Experts believe that one of the main reasons for the drying up of Lake Urmia is the construction of 57 dams in the northwest of Iran by the IRGC. The construction of 82 dams in the catchment area of Anzali lagoon is the reason the water level in this lagoon has decreased by one to two meters.
Even though the IRGC has built the dams under the pretext of providing drinking water and agriculture for the people, these dams only provide about ten percent of the water consumed by agricultural lands. Consequently, 40% of the country’s drinking water is wasted every year, and in the agricultural sector, 30% of water is wasted every year. The total of these two wastages is more than 40 billion cubic meters of water annually. This rate of water wastage is about one third of the country’s water consumption.
This regime that has spent all the wealth of the country for its own survival, does not care about the improvement of the environmental situation. For this reason, we are witnessing the destruction of many wetlands, rivers, etc.
This is just one more reason why the people of Iran are fed up with their rulers, who have no respect for any form of life in their country. And while regime officials are fast busy playing the blame game, the people of Iran know full well that the root of the problems is the regime in its entirety.
On August 27, the regime’s Eghtesad Online website reported that Iranians spending 300 trillion rials on buying and selling virtual private network (VPN) access last year to be able to use the many online services that are blocked by Iran’s regime.
“Statistics indicate that Iranians use the Internet for 169 minutes daily. This statistic shows that 80 percent of Iranians use VPNs to access social networks and messaging apps,” according to the Eghtesad Online.
Published statistics show that 87 percent of Internet users of various age groups in Iran use mobile devices to access the Internet.
According to these statistics, the total number of domestic and foreign online stores and social networks used by users in 2022 exceeded 780,000.
Contrary to the fact that Telegram is one of the first blocked social networks in Iran, Telegram posts on Iranian channels were collectively viewed more than 590 billion times in 2022.
In an interview about the current situation of VPNs in Iran, Mehdi Moslehi, an expert in cybersecurity, told the regime-linked Entekhab website in May, “Until 2018, the monthly sales transaction of VPNs was 50 billion rials (approximately $4.8 million), but now, considering the situation last year, this number has reached close to 5 trillion rials (approximately $10 million) per month.”
In January, during the peak of the nationwide protests, Saeed Naghavi, a member of the board of directors of the IT Union, reported a 3,000 percent increase in demand for VPNs in October 2022 saying, “Reports show that the search volume of Iranian users for obtaining VPNs has set a historical record.”
The Ministry of Sports and Youth also reported during the nationwide protests in 2022: “70 percent of users use VPNs, and out of this number, for every eight people, one person uses a paid VPN.”
Furthermore, in February, a report was published stating that the internet shutdown and filtering in Iran from October 2022 to the end of January 2023 has caused approximately 100 trillion rials (approximately $200 billion) in monthly losses to the Iranian economy.
Blocking access to online services will hit Iran’s economy extremely hard. For example, during the November 2019 protests, the regime carried out a complete shutdown of the internet for several weeks, causing billions of dollars in damage to the economy.
Internet censorship in Iran expanded during the nationwide protests in 2022, and security forces blocked popular social networks.
One of the side effects of filtering in Iran is the income gained by individuals and entities close to the government.
In this regard, Hamid Rezazadeh, the son of Ensieh Khazali, the deputy of the regime’s president, Ebrahim Raisi, is mentioned as the founder of a VPN service for Iranians called Betternet, according to published reports. (Rezazadeh, a Canadian citizen, is one of many regime elites who are enjoying dual citizenship without being persecuted by the government.)
Mohammad Hassan Asafari, a member of the parliament, stated in an interview with the state-backed student news agency (ISNA) about the chaotic market of buying and selling VPNs in the country: “The income and financial turnover of filtering profiteers exceed 500 trillion rials ($1 billion) per year, and they don’t pay any taxes.”
“How is it possible that a government capable of blocking [internet services] cannot block these VPNs as well? It seems that merchants exist within certain organizations involved in filtering, and I believe this issue needs to be addressed.” He added, “Does the Minister of Information and Communications Technology know who sells these VPNs and with whom they are affiliated?”
Aside from the discrepancies in the numbers reported by different representatives and experts, which clearly indicate the uncontrollable and unregulated nature of this black market, it is worth noting that the restrictive policies in this regard have not been able to bring about significant changes in the buying and selling of these VPNs.
Although the sale of censorship circumvention tools is considered illegal according to the law, it is observed that actors in this field continue their work and even expand it based on the existing demand.
Now, in one of the latest statements, Jalal Rashidi Kouchi, a member of the regime’s parliament, expressed his criticism of the current situation by tweeting: “I had previously warned that the only achievement of blocking is the creation of a thriving market for buying and selling these tools.” He continued, “Censorship has not reduced people’s presence on foreign social networks; it has only caused inconvenience and expenses for the people.”
Even in recent days, as the regime has been experimenting with throttling internet access, many businesses have been disrupted. At present, Iran’s economy is on the verge of total collapse. Every day, people from different walks of life are coming to the streets to protest inflation, high prices, unemployment, and other economic problems. An overhaul of internet access will further aggravate economic woes, triggering more of the same protests that the regime is trying to prevent.
At this point, the mullahs are caught in a web of conflicting dilemmas, each of which will further nudge it toward another major confrontation with the Iranian people and their resistance movement.
In its latest report the World Bank has reported about “significant” internal and external risks threatening the Iranian economy in the medium term, as well as the high inflation rate and persistent unemployment in the country.
In the section on internal risks, the report refers to the “escalation of social tensions and strikes in the industrial sector” in Iran, emphasizing that the continued internet restrictions by the regime could have long-term detrimental effects on employment and economic activities, especially in the services sector.
Following the nationwide protests in 2022 and the widespread workers’ strikes in recent months, the government, in addition to violently suppressing the protesters, has once again restricted access to the internet and intensified filtering in the country.
According to a report published by NetBlocks, an organization that monitors internet connectivity around the world, after the widespread internet shutdown in Iran, it was revealed that the internet shutdown between September 19 and September 30, 2022, had caused an economic loss of $1.5 million per hour, equivalent to 450 billion Iranian rials, to businesses. This figure is estimated to be around 10 trillion Iranian rials per hour if we take into account the exchange rate of 290,000 rials per dollar at that time.
By this calculation, it can be said that the 11-day internet shutdown and disruption caused 110 trillion rials in losses to the country. At the same time, some reports also indicate that at least 10 million people are engaged in businesses on authorized online platforms.
Meanwhile, the recently published 48-page report on the World Bank’s website indicates that Iran’s economy had a 3.8 percent growth in 2022.
The international institution has also predicted that the growth of gross domestic product will remain limited in the medium term due to ongoing sanctions and insufficient and limited investments.
The issue of drought and severe climate changes in Iran is also among the other issues raised in this report.
According to the World Bank’s assessment, the environmental crisis in the country will lead to detrimental effects on agricultural production, unemployment, and food security, and the “deepening” of this crisis will result in “larger shocks.”
External risks to Iran’s economy include the decline in global oil demand and prices, as well as U.S. sanctions.
Unemployment, Poverty, and High Inflation
Meanwhile, another section of this report addresses the issues of unemployment and poverty, along with the unbridled inflation rate in Iran, stating that inflation in 2022 exceeded 40 percent for the fourth consecutive year and continues to remain high.
According to the World Bank’s assessment, Iran’s inflation rate was 48.7 percent last year, and the significant increase in food prices due to the elimination of subsidies for essential imports and the global rise in food prices has been among the main factors contributing to high inflation in the country.
The report emphasizes that inflation in food prices particularly affects low-income households, as food expenses constitute a significant portion of their expenditures.
Additionally, the disparity between wage growth and the inflation rate has put economic pressure on Iranian households.
The World Bank also highlights that the more than 40 percent devaluation of the Iranian rial in 2022 has been influenced by global inflation, reinforcing inflation expectations and putting further pressure on prices.
The report further states that during the COVID-19 pandemic, one million jobs were lost in Iran, and the number of employed individuals in the country is still 700,000 less than during the peak of the pandemic.
While Iranian authorities have announced a decrease in the unemployment rate in recent months and its transition to single digits, the World Bank states that the main reason for the decline in the unemployment rate in Iran is the “inactivity” of a significant portion of the workforce.
In fact, the active population in search of employment in Iran has been decreasing. The unemployment rate is the ratio of the population actively seeking employment to the employed individuals, which indicates many jobseekers have lost heart and are no longer looking for employment.
Earlier, the Research Center of the regime’s Parliament had stated in a report that many unemployed individuals have become tired of job hunting and have essentially become part of the inactive population, which is why the real unemployment rate is “2.5 times” higher than official government statistics.
According to the World Bank’s assessment, the economic participation rate (individuals who either have a job or are actively seeking one) is at a “weak” level of 40.9 percent, indicating “insufficient job opportunities” in Iran.
The evaluation by this international institution highlights the high rates of inflation, poverty, and unemployment while Sowlat Mortazavi, the regime’s Minister of Labor, claimed on August 20 that a “considerable portion of absolute poverty has been eradicated.”
This claim is made despite the fact that in May of this year, the Research Center of the Iranian Parliament stated in a report that approximately 11 million more people were added to the country’s impoverished population between 2011 and 2021.
