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Vienna JCPOA Talks Have Not Come to a Final Conclusion

Esmaeil Mohades
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Vienna JCPOA Talks Have Not Come to a Final Conclusion

On the eve of the fifth round of Vienna talks between Iran and world powers over the former’s illicit nuclear projects, Mikhail Ulyanov, Russia’s representative in the Atomic Energy Agency, said in the talks that the fifth round would probably be the last round of negotiations. But evidence suggests that the fifth round of Vienna talks has not come to an appropriate conclusion.

Then in a tweet on June 1, 2021, he stated that, “Everything is so much complicated in relations between Iran and the #IAEA to our regret! Nevertheless, we appreciate the fact that they continue to maintain the necessary level of cooperation. We have reasons to believe that the current difficulties are of temporary character.”

Vienna talks over four rounds and the fifth round was in progress that news announced by Rafael Grossi, the Director General of the Atomic Energy Agency, made the maintenance of the talks more complicated as he said:

“Iran’s failure to provide credible explanations for traces of uranium found at two undeclared sites is “a big problem” that is affecting the country’s credibility.”

Then he added that a linear return to the old JCPOA, “It is not possible. Iran has accumulated knowledge, has accumulated centrifuges, and has accumulated material.”

Then he added: “They have developed new centrifuges. Research and development have taken place. It was not allowed by the original JCPOA. It has happened and now the issue is how to deal with the results. What you absolutely need is a way to verify that if they have that knowledge, it is not being used to make bombs.”

Separately, France, one of the signatories to the deal, voiced concern after a report from the U.N. nuclear watchdog which showed on Monday that Iran had failed to explain traces of uranium found at several undeclared sites.

Now following the release of the new International Atomic Energy Agency report on the origin of new uranium particles, the three European powers must now decide whether they want to resume pressure to pass a resolution against the Iranian regime, as it could overshadow and making the ongoing talks to revive the JCPOA more complicated.

Three months ago, three European countries, Britain, France, and Germany, suspended the plan that the United States had submitted to the Board of Governors to issue a resolution against the Iranian regime on the discovery of new nuclear particles.

According to the latest report by the IAEA, the Iranian regime has not been able to provide a convincing explanation of the origin of the new uranium particles on several of its unannounced sites.

Of course, these were not the only news which are complicating the situation. In the middle of the fifth-round talks, the Agency provided another negative information about Iran’s nuclear program.

Iran’s 20 percent uranium deposits increased to 62 kilograms, which is an increase of 44.4 kg comparing the amount in February. The Agency also announced on May 31, Iran’s enriched uranium reserves reached 16 times the authorized ceiling allowed by the JCPOA. This rate was agreed upon 202 kg, while now Iran has 3.41 kg enriched uranium.

All this news is worrying while the Agency previously on 23 February 2021 has also announced that they have no access to the regulatory data.

Surprisingly, with this level of ambition, Iran’s government expectation that all the sanctions will be lifted at once is just an illusion.

The Vienna negotiations indicate that the main issues behind the scenes remained not only unresolved, but the agency’s recent statement adds to the volume of the complications and stagnation.

And the proof for that is, that the representatives of the negotiating counties returned to their capitals on June 1, 2021, without any progress, despite all the regime’s claims about progress.

Laurence Norman, a Wall Street Journal reporter in Brussels, wrote in a Twitter message on June 1: “Understand the current plan is to organise a break from Iran talks tomorrow or Thursday for delegations to return to capitals. Could change but that’s the plan. The Big question: when to resume and whether to continue before Iran presidential elections is not yet settled.”

Iran’s Capital Drains Crisis

Sia Rajabi
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Iran’s Capital Drains Crisis

If Iran continues to face a decrease in the accumulation of human capital and eventually economic and social losses, this crisis will enter a new phase. This means that the government cannot consider brain drain and the loss of capital as a minor issue, because many of Iran’s challenges today are due to a lack of capital.

First crisis:

According to statistics, Iran is one of the top countries in the world in terms of brain drain, and it is said that 180,000 Iranian specialists leave the country annually. The secretary of the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, emphasizing that 54,000 Iranians study abroad, claimed that this was due to a “hostile conspiracy” adding, ‘The enemies of the Islamic Revolution are looking to hunt our elites.’

But the reality is that this issue is beyond the possibility of a ‘conspiracy theory’ and consider the ‘enemy’ as the cause of this challenge.

The chairman of the board of the Tehran Nursing System announced the monthly migration of 500 Iranian nurses abroad and said that most Iranian nurses migrate to North American countries such as Canada and Sweden in Europe, as well as some countries in the Persian Gulf. Iran is even ranked fifth in the United States in terms of foreign doctoral graduates.

A survey of statistics from the past decade (2010 to 2019) shows that, after China, India, South Korea, and Taiwan, immigrants from Iran make up the largest number of US foreign doctoral graduates, and one in 40 foreigners who received a doctorate was Iranian.

In other words, in the last decade, exactly 5,506 Iranians have received doctorates in the United States, and according to 2015 statistics, approximately 5,000 of these people have remained in the United States.

Out of a total of 54,000 Iranian students studying abroad, 25 percent of them have emmigrated with a three-digit entrance exam rank.

Second crisis:

It is not only the elites and students who are leaving the country. Children of some officials and rich people of the society, based on their wealth, do not consider Iran worthy to live in, while their fathers are making Iran a hell to live in.

Seyed Mohammad Gharazi, one of the presidential candidates who was excluded from competing in the upcoming election, about the officials’ children said recently: “Today, 5,000 children of government officials live in the United States and have taken people’s dollars and think they are living, but I am sure they are carrying the humiliation of this world and the hereafter with them and their fathers.”

Mahmoud Bahmani, the governor of the Central Bank during the presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, had said: “At present, $148 billion is the balance of the accounts in foreign banks of the officials’ children, and this is more than Iran’s reserves.”

Abbas Akhoondi, former Minister of Roads and Urban Development also said: “In the last three years, about $15 billion has been spent on buying homes abroad, and with the wrong domestic policies, Iranians have bought 1,600 homes in Turkey in the last three months. According to the Turkish Statistics Center, Iranians are still the largest group of foreign home buyers in the country. The result of the aggressive actions is that in the last 50 years, 3.1 million people have left Iran, that is, 3.8 million of our population have emigrated.”

A recent report published by ILNA stated, ‘Iranian citizens have purchased 5,939 housing units in Turkey.’

Third crisis:

The collapse of money and national capital and the rise in prices have led to the fact that many Afghans prefer the insecurity of their own country than to stay in Iran.

According to statistics, the record for the largest number of undocumented Afghan migrants returning from Iran in 2020 has been broken. Some experts consider the fall in the value of the rial and the difficult labor market conditions as the most important reasons for their return. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that in 2020 alone, about 859,000 Afghan refugees returned from Iran. In recent days, news has been published about a 35 percent increase in the migration of Afghan citizens from Iran.

Conclusion:

The structures are such that the future president of Iran will be not able to bring the country to such a development that the losses will return. The reality is that the people of Iran are at the crossroad of ‘Staying or leaving’. Iran’s today situation is not like in the past and many Iranian families, and their relatives, are people who have emigrated and many of those who have left are longing to leave their homeland and are struggling with the difficult question of whether to leave or stay.

This is the result of 40 years of the mullahs’ rule, and rule of corruption, looting, discrimination, human rights violations, and executions.

What Were Human Rights Like in Iran Last Month?

Hoshang Amiri
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What Were Human Rights Like in Iran Last Month?

The May 2021 report by Iran Human Rights Monitor into the situation of human rights abuses in Iran is now out and, as always, it makes for disturbing and horrific reading, specifically relating to executions, suppression, and arrests. We’re going to look at the report here, but we recommend looking at the full thing.

Executions and Arbitrary murders

Some 21 people were executed in Iran during May, including 15 on drug charges and two on rape charges, which are not death penalty crimes under global law. Of course, it’s not surprising when you consider that Iran is the biggest executioner in the world in terms of its population.

One of these cases was of Behzad Adl, 25, who was executed in Shiraz’s Adelabad Prison for rape. But he’d only confessed under torture, was denied access to a lawyer, and retracted the confession in court. Another is Baluchi citizen Mehran Naroui who was tortured into confessing, according to Amnesty International, and executed despite a social media campaign to save his life.

There were 16 people killed and 15 injured by the Iranian police without arrest or trial, which is something that the security forces often do to border porters.

Arrests and Abuse of Prisoners

More than 540 people were arrested, with many of them detained for their religious or political activities.

Meanwhile, the following prisoners went on hunger strike to protest the denial of medical treatment for themselves or others. This includes journalist Reza Taleshian Jalodarzadeh, filmmaker Mohammad Nourizad, and political prisoner Saba Kord Afshari.

Discrimination against religious and ethnic minorities

There were many instances of discrimination against people who are from minority groups last month. Here are just a few instances:

  • Sentencing of nine Baha’i citizens to prison on bogus charges of “acting against national security” and one woman for trying to empower women
  • Sentencing of three Azerbaijani Turk activists to prison and one to a 5 million Tomans fine on trumped-up political charges
  • Arbitrary arrest of 26 young men and one elderly woman for political activism

Internet censorship

A prominent internet freedom activist cited leaked confidential letters that showed the deputy head of Tehran’s Justice Department ordering that Google Play, Instagram, and VPNs be filtered by May 22. These letters, which said that the Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) would be dealing with companies that didn’t comply, perhaps by closing the company or by prosecuting the manager, were confirmed by Mehr News in Iran.

NCRI Women: Report on Women’s Protest in Iran in May

Jubin Katiraie
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NCRI Women: Report on Women’s Protest in Iran in May

The Women’s Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) has released a report into the increased levels of protest by Iranian women during May, with a particular focus on encouraging others to boycott the election.

They advised that women from all classes and employment sectors have been taking to the streets in most cities and villages over everything from power outages, water shortages, house demolitions, non-payment of wages, and a massive number of other issues. The problems that these women are facing have increased the protests and the number of people who want to boycott the presidential election.

Protests by Iranian women were at least 127 in May, with 29 by teachers who want to be officially employed with the benefits that come along with that, 42 by students who want to avoid in-person exams during the pandemic, and many more by hospital staff over salary non-payment.

Brave women have also been taking part in resistance units activities to encourage people to boycott the elections. They’ve been putting up posters, handing out flyers, and writing graffiti, all with slogans like “Election boycott is a patriotic duty” and “My vote is overthrowing the Regime”. They’ve even made videos that are published on social media, like the mothers of the November 2019 martyrs, who declared that “We want the overthrow of this regime. We vote for the regime’s overthrow”.

One woman said: “Those who vote in this election are just as guilty as the regime officials who ordered the killing of our children. We will never forgive. Anyone who casts a ballot and participates in this election commits a crime and treason.”

In addition, the mothers of the victims of the 1988 massacre gathered in Tehran’s Khavaran Cemetery on May 13 to condemn the authorities for destroying the mass graves containing the remains of the martyrs. During their protest, they held placards and chanted slogans against the regime, particularly Judiciary head and presidential candidate Ebrahim Raisi.

Raisi was on the notorious Tehran Death Committee during the 1988 massacre and was responsible for sending thousands of political prisoners to their deaths, for which the United States has blacklisted him due to human rights violations.

The signs that they held up included:

  • “Khavaran, the enduring document of crime against humanity in Iran, the 1988 massacre”
  • “Until the prosecution of, and accountability for the criminals, we will neither forgive, nor forget.”

Iran’s Election Boycott Looks Certain

Sia Rajabi
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Iran’s Election Boycott Looks Certain

Iranians at home and abroad came together on Sunday to take part in a social media campaign where they spread their anti-regime messages under the hashtag #BoycottIranShamElections, which got tens of thousands of shares in just the first day.

The Iranian opposition, has been calling on the people to boycott the elections for years, citing that nothing has ever changed under the rulling theocracy or will ever change.

Over the past year, the opposition’s internal network have been leading a rigorous and well-supported campaign advocating an all-out election boycott, by putting up posters of opposition leaders on highways and anti-regime graffiti on public walls in the city. There were at least 250 demonstrations in April alone.

It’s no wonder that so many people wish to boycott the elections because voting will not only make no difference to the Iranian people’s everyday lives, it won’t make a difference to the eventual winner either.

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has already made it clear that he supports judiciary head Ebrahim Raisi for president, which means the rest of the establishment support him too. In fact, the Guardian Council disqualified over 500 candidates, including many high-profile ones like former Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, to pave the way for Raisi’s victory.

Mohammad  Mohaddessin, the chair of the National Councill of Resistance of Iran’s (NCRI) Foreign Affairs Committee, said Wednesday that this was Khamenei’s attempt to consolidate power as social unrest increases in the face of the various crises that Iran is facing.

This social unrest resulted in three nationwide protests over the past four years,  with the people calling for regime change each time. The anger of the people toward the regime even led to the widespread boycott of the parliamentary elections in February 2020, despite the authorities attempt to play down the pandemic to get people out to vote.

That boycott was driven in part by the major protests, but also because of the opposition’s campaigns, so it stands to reason that after the officials’ botched handling of the pandemic, more people will boycott the elections.

Mohaddessin said: “The nationwide call for the boycott of the sham election has gained momentum, and people are openly calling for the regime’s overthrow. [This indicates that there is a] looming nationwide uprising waiting in the wings [that is] far more intense and widespread than in previous years.”

Alongside this online conference, there are many facts that this time the regime’s presidential election will be faced with the people’s boycott.

According to a video published on the Internet, in a free tribune that was held in the second square of Naziabad, Tehran, one of the youths from behind the tribune said, ‘Everyone who votes has oppressed the 1,500 killed in November (2019).’ There is no difference between the candidates and ‘all of them are looters.’ (Internet June 2, 2021)

Mark Dubowitz, the CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) in his tweet on June 1 about the regime’s election said: “Reminder: Frontrunner for IRI president sanctioned by US Treasury for “executions of individuals who were juveniles at time of their crime; torture, other cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment punishment of prisoners in Iran, including amputations.”

Attacking the regime’s sham-election Struan Stevenson former MEP in a tweet quoted his article about this election: “My article on Iran’s so called elections. Iran’s mullahs choose executioner as front-runner for president.“

He pointed: “Raisi’s fast track to the presidency is the clearest sign yet that the supreme leader is panicking. Since 2018, there have been three nationwide uprisings, with daily protests continuing in towns and cities across Iran. The economy has collapsed. More than 75% of the population now struggle to survive on daily incomes below the international poverty line. Children rummage through trash cans for scraps of food.” (UPI, June 1, 2021)

The situation for the regime is becoming so critical this time one the regime’s officials Hassan Abassi regrets about the regime’s decision to holing elections and said: “We have a problem that started from Mr. Khatami’s term in 1997. Before that, in the fifth parliament we approved and accepted the model of Western democracy in the elections. We made a mistake.

“Now, the UAE, which does not have elections, are not its people more relaxed? Qatar does not have elections, Oman does not have elections, this Turkmenistan above us does not have elections, are they not more relaxed? We made a mistake in holding the elections, we should not have elections like in the UAE and Qatar so that the people’s nerves are calmer.” (State-run daily Ghatreh, June 2, 2021)

Then Ali Sufi, government expert admitted: “We do not see any electoral excitement, the election atmosphere is not political, it is security. This planning (elimination of candidates) based on expediency is considered more important than elections.” (ILNA, June 2, 2021)

Iran Media Admits to Economic Problems Being Caused by Mullahs

Pooya Stone
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Iran Media Admits to Economic Problems Being Caused by Mullahs

Over the past few days, Iranian state media has been admitting to some of the economic crises that the country is facing. Given that these outlets are linked to the mainstream factions, this is a major admission.

The newspapers and websites already reveal the infighting that goes on between the factions, but their latest pieces highlight that the Iranian people are suffering under the yoke of the mullahs on all levels because of the authorities’ corruption and policies.

The Tabnak News Agency wrote on May 23: “Economists believe that the country is currently facing many challenges such as structural inflation, low economic growth, coronavirus pandemic and lack of rapid vaccination, nuclear negotiations and sanctions, demographic window and the employment problem, social security and pension funds, improving the business environment, water resources crisis, capital outflow in the country, and privatization.”

One of the major problems for the Iranian people in terms of the economy is the sky-rocketing inflation rate, which is making everything from food to housing more expensive.

The Sharq daily said that this had resulted in $350 billion stagnant capital in the housing sector, $650 billion in gold and coins, and $20 billion in the foreign exchange market, adding up to $1 trillion. They also noted that the point-to-point inflation rate from March 2020 to 2021 is 48.7%.

The Arman daily wrote: “The current issue of Iranian society, especially on the eve of the elections, is the livelihood of the people. People are facing challenges in daily life, and there is an employment crisis. On the other hand, salaries are not only not strengthened but also weakened. People’s purchasing power has dropped dramatically.”

The article then posited about how the economy got here, before explaining that the issue was “structural” and that while the economy is not an issue for the officials, it is for the people who experience homelessness, unemployment, and poor living conditions. The paper wrote that the authorities only care about the economy when it causes the people to revolt.

While officials often try to blame international sanctions for economic issues, the media and economists know that the true reason is institutionalized and systematic corruption.

Economist Hossain Raghfar said: “One of the issues today in the case of power outages is the issue of currency codes. China, India, Turkey, and Poland are [mining bitcoin] in Iran because of cheap electricity. Or the scarcity of meat. On the one hand, livestock is smuggled to the countries of the southern Persian Gulf, and on the other hand, meat is imported.”

The mullahs have a plan titled “Empowerment and sustainability of the Social Security Organization” but the ILNA has said that this actually “fundamentally changes” how pensions are calculated, reduces the benefits, and harms workers’ rights.

About this reality the head of Iran’s Chamber of Commerce Gholam Hossein Shafei stated in a meeting of economic activists with Mohsen Rezaei, one of the presidential candidates on June 1 said:

“Fortunately, in this period, the approach of all candidates is the economic approach. But it should be noted that we have witnessed this in the past.”

The head of the Iranian Chamber of Commerce continued: “Today, it is embarrassing that the share of the Iranian economy in the world economy has halved compared to 40 years ago, but we do not compare ourselves with the world. These are all the results of meaningless promises.

“Despite the mineral resources, and with the manpower capacity which is almost enough, but the question is, why are we now in such a situation?” (Sepehr News daily, June 1, 2021)

In an interview with ISNA, Kambiz Norouzi a juristic said that the plan to ‘ban officials from leaving Iran after the end of their responsibilities’ which is on the agenda of the Parliamentary Judiciary Commission, does not show the fight against corruption, but it shows the depth of corruption in the country. The dimensions of corruption in rent-seeking management have become so complex, widespread, organized, and deep that such plans have unfortunately been relied upon to combat it.” (Khabar Khoy website, June 1, 2021)

How the West Should Respond to Iran’s Presidential Election

Hoshang Amiri
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How the West Should Respond to Iran’s Presidential Election

Iran’s Guardian Council, which supervises elections, announced last Wednesday the final list of approved candidates for the presidential election on June 18.

In a move that shocked many, the Council disqualified several prominent officials, including former parliament speaker Ali Larijani, but this is believed to be a way for supreme leader Ali Khamenei, who directly or indirectly appoints every Council member, to consolidate power amid the people’s rising discontent.

With Larijani out of the race, the frontrunner is judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi, a long time high-ranking official, who was personally responsible for the deaths of hundreds of political prisoners during the 1988 massacre, where 30,000 dissidents were murdered in just a few weeks after show trials presided over by the so-called Death Commissions.

The simple fact is that elections in Iran are not about democracy; they’re a mere façade that only serves to legitimise the rulling theocracy to the Western world while crushing the people. Given the current situation in Iran, thanks to the failing economy, the pandemic, and increased human rights abuses, the government is in the weakest place it’s ever been and officials believe that this is the single most important election since the mullahs took power in 1979. Khamenei needed to consolidate power to maintain control for a little bit longer, which is why the Council disqualified all of the reformist candidates who stood a chance at winning.

After all, the people have already made their feelings clear about the current rulling system in two nationwide protests since the 2017 presidential elections, as well as the boycott of the parliamentary elections last year. It is believed that the people will be boycotting this election on a scale not yet seen; rejecting the idea that there is any difference between moderates and hardliners.

Maryam Rajavi, the president of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said: “There is no longer any excuse to appease and engage with this regime. Any interaction and cooperation with the mullahs will be in service of the regime’s repression and killing of the Iranian people and its obtaining of nuclear weapons and inciting warmongering in the region.”

The West must end its appeasement of Tehran, take a tough stance on the mullahs, admit that the elections are illegitimate, hold Tehran to account for its crimes against the Iranian people and the rest of the world, and stand with the Iranian people in their fight for freedom.

Goals of Iran’s Warmongering in the Middle East

Shahin Mahmoudi
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Goals of Iran’s Warmongering in the Middle East

“I bet if Biden warns he is pulling out of Iran deal negotiations if Hamas doesn’t stop the air strikes, the war would suddenly come to an end.”

This meaningful sentence was expressed by Nikki Haley, the former U.S. Ambassador to the UN, about the recent 11-day Gaza war in which Iran was the first and the main beneficiary and had started this escalation to overshadow its two crises, its presidential election and the international nuclear deal known formally by the acronym JCPOA.

Iran’s regime is known to use blackmailing, terrorizing, and starting proxy wars to reach its goals. Now the regime’s state-run daily Shargh is implying this, quoting Kayhan Barzegar, an expert of International Relations, speaking about the JCPOA and its relationship with regional affairs, which does not need any accurate explanations and by itself is eloquent enough, and the only remark by reading this text is just changing the name of Iran the country with Iran’s regime, because the country’s people do not have stand to gain anything in this at all.

“One of the main roots of pessimism, beyond the technical issues of how to lift sanctions all at once, goes back to the West’s repeated demand that Iran accept that the nuclear talks include a wider range of regional issues and the limitation of Iran’s missile program.

“But the West must understand that the successful revival of the JCPOA will itself lead to regional negotiations, because when the sense of strategic threat to Iran from the United States and the West is partially resolved by the revival of JCPOA, our country ‘naturally’ enters meaningful regional talks to resolve the current crisis.

“This is because it has the upper hand in the fields in the region and is not worried about losing, and at the same time is aware that regional stability is necessary for the country’s economic growth and strengthening neighborly relations as a major principle of the country’s foreign policy.

“The conclusion of the JCPOA goes beyond the lifting of economic sanctions, but also a testing ground for Iran to build trust and further dialogue with the West to resolve current geopolitical problems, including stabilizing Iran’s position and role in the post-Arab Spring vacuum and resolving the current crisis in Syria. Iraq, Yemen, etc. were within the framework of the country’s interests.

“This point has been emphasized several times by the officials of our country on various occasions because our country itself suffers the most from instability and the presence of foreigners in the region.

“Iran also increased its bargaining power and deterrence to achieve its larger goal of maintaining the country’s survival by reducing its nuclear commitments in several stages. Of course, unlike regional talks, which have the necessary capacity to enter a win-win equation, the issue of limiting Iran’s missile program is more of a win-lose equation and to the detriment of our country.

“The West’s insistence on the issue of missile restraint has always been useless and the only disruption to the negotiation process. Indeed, the successful revival of the JCPOA is a ‘precondition’ for lasting regional stability.

“The successful revival of the JCPOA and Iran’s relative withdrawal from the strategic distrust of the West and the United States is an important step toward Iran’s constructive and meaningful entry into resolving regional disputes.

“Iran’s geopolitical superiority in West Asia allows the country to use its field role and diplomatic influence to achieve the larger goal of regional stability, which is undoubtedly in the national interest of the country. But what is needed is for the West to get out of the misconception of connecting the JCPOA triangle, regional issues and missiles, which in turn could deepen the existing process of mutual distrust and even lead to the instability of possible future nuclear agreements.” (State-run daily Shargh, May 30, 2021)

70-Percent Increase in Price of Food in Iran

Jubin Katiraie
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70-Percent Increase in Price of Food in Iran

On May 23, the semiofficial ISNA news agency reported an over-70 percent increase in the prices of six foodstuff in Iran since the beginning of the new Persian year on March 21.

“The new Persian year began with an increase in inflation in three indicators of monthly, annual, and point-to-point,” ISNA wrote, adding, “This increase in the point-to-point inflation, which shows the increase in households’ expenditures in comparison to the similar period in the past year, reached 50 percent.”

Already, the Ministry of Industry, Mine, and Trade announced that the edible oil price has risen by 30 percent. Aside from edible oil, other items of the Iranian people’s food basket have seen major price jump.

For instance, citizens have witnessed a 78.4-percent increase in prices of the group of tea, coffee, cacao, soft drink, and juices; 75.3-percent increase in prices of the group of milk, cheese, and eggs; 73.1-percent increase in the group of fish and shellfish; 72.9-percent increase in the group of red and white meat, poultry, and their products.

Furthermore, officials have recently raised the price of the group of sugar, jam, honey, chocolate, and sweet, by 69.9 percent. They have also increased the price of furniture and home appliances by 67.7 percent.

Meanwhile, regarding the annual inflation, the group of transportation, oil and lipid, and furniture and home appliances faced the highest inflation with 65.1 percent, 61.3 percent, and 53.7 percent, respectively.

These unprecedented leaps in the inflation rate have driven the majority of society, particularly working families, to more difficulties. “More than 90 percent of workers do not have job security and live below the poverty line,” the semiofficial ILNA news agency quoted Habib Sadeghzadeh, deputy chief of the Labor Council in East Azarbaijan province, as saying on February 7.

On the other hand, the Iranian government refuses to practice the resolution 98 and 87 of the International Labor Organization. In such circumstances, workers do not have any choice except enduring backbreaking pressure.

“There is not independent, democratic, and worker-reliant union because temporary contracts and a fear about the future have silenced laborers and blocked their path for demanding,” quoted Sobh Eqtesad daily Faramarz Tofighi, the chief of wage committee of the Labor Council, as saying on May 23.

In response to people’s grievances, in an interview with the TV Channel Two on March 11, Deputy Minister of Industry, Mine, and Trade Abbas Ghobadi suggested people to avoid purchasing and consuming fruits due to their high prices.

Indeed, the government does not have any approach toward people’s growing demands except oppressive measures and ridiculous methods avoiding people of consumption.

“Should you be the deputy of a great ministry to provide such solution for the expensive prices of chicken, red meat, or other essential goods?” Mostaghel daily mocked Ghobadi, leaking parts of the real sentiments of society against Iran’s leaders.

A Massive Blow to Iran’s Agricultural Sector

Pooya Stone
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A Massive Blow to Iran’s Agricultural Sector

With less than a month left to the June 18 Presidential election in Iran, opponents of President Hassan Rouhani reveal surprising details about the administration’s horrible performance in the past eight years.

In its May 22 edition, Sepehr newspaper, affiliated with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s faction, criticized the Rouhani administration for its failures in the agricultural sector. “The Rouhani administration made three mistakes in the agricultural sector leading to chaos in the market and loss of national resources,” Sepehr wrote. “The next administration has a heavy duty to revive farmers’ lost trust.”

Given the wrong infrastructures of production management, incorrect financial-exchange policies, absolute reliance on Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with major world powers known officially as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and lack of export destinations, the agricultural products had the worst market in the past decades.

Farmers have been selling their products ten times lower than the market price. Mind-blowing expenditures compelled them to leave their products, and there are many videos circulating on social media showing tons of onion, tomato, potato, apple, orange, and watermelon left besides roads or in depots.

In his term in office, Rouhani suspended the abstraction law, which contrary to its name had focused on marketing tasks and responsibilities in the Agriculture Jihad Ministry. This suspension drove the market to much more chaos and instability. Based on the law, the ministry had burdened all tasks of production chain, which has partially improved farmers’ conditions and balanced the market.

Indeed, Rouhani suspended the law for two years following objections by the Parliament (Majlis) to establishing the Trade Ministry. In this context, neither the Industry, Mine, and Trade Ministry nor the Agriculture Jihad Ministry admitted the production chain’s obligations.

Rouhani practically laid the blame of economic dilemmas, including disorders in the market and above-40-percent inflation, on the Majlis’s failure to establishment of the Trade Ministry.

On the other hand, livestock farmers faced massive disadvantages. Systematic corruption rendered to shaping giant importers, which hoard feed. Whenever the feed became scarce, these importers sold their cargoes at five-fold prices, causing an astronomical rise in the price of protein products in the market. This is while livestock farmers have to spend 70 percent of their revenue for just feed.

Farmers and orchardists also deal with numerous dilemmas and difficulties, including high price of seeds, water shortage, and lack of government support. In this respect, farmers’ costs are far higher than their incomes.

“Here, farmers had produced significant amount of onion but there is no consumer. The government does not export, and farmers have to leave their products or stockpile in warehouses to decay,” said a farmer from the southeastern province of Kerman.

“Recently, the Rural Cooperative Organization buys each kilo of onion for 6,000 rials [$0.26]. This price does not cover farmers’ harvesting costs,” he added.

Watermelon farmer Alireza Dejkameh pointed to the dramatic distinction between the prices in farms and in the market. “In farms, dealers purchase each kilo [of watermelon] for 5,000 rials [$0.21] while they sell it for 50,000 rials [$2.17] in the market,” he said. “Once I sent a 25-ton truck of watermelon to Mahabad city [in northwestern province of West Azarbaijan]. The transportation cost was 13 million rials [$56.52]. I had to give the cargo instead of the rent.”

Notably, there are around 250,000 tons of apple and orange in Tehran’s depots and cold storages, according to the chief of grocers’ union. “These fruits are on the cusp of decay,” he added. However, the government neither distributes them among needy people, who have not eaten fruits for months, nor exports them to gain revenue.

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