"95 Percent of Foreign Students" in Iran Are from Iraq and Afghanistan

The former head of Iran's Student Affairs Organization, without distinguishing between students and seminarians, states that about 95 percent of the "94,000 international students" in Iran are from Iraq and Afghanistan, with only about five thousand from other countries. In a report published by the Tasnim news agency, close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, on Saturday, November 26, it is mentioned that so far "56,000 students from Iraq" and "33,000 students from Afghanistan" have been attracted to Iran. Meanwhile, according to statistics from the Higher Education Research and Planning Institute in 2021, only "about 9,000 Afghan students" were studying in universities, and with the undifferentiated statistics quoted in the Tasnim report, it is unclear how many of the "33,000 students from Afghanistan" are currently studying in academic centers. At the same time, it is unclear how many of the 56,000 Iraqi students mentioned by Mr. Dadashpour are seminarians or members of the Hashd al-Shaabi forces. Students protested against the "entry of Hashd al-Shaabi militias from Iraq into Tehran University." Hussein Mousavi Bakhti, the deputy of education and training for Hashd al-Shaabi, announced during a visit to Tehran on July 9 last year, after a meeting with the president of Tehran University and the university's professors' mobilization, that there was an "agreement and cooperation with Tehran University." This Hashd al-Shaabi official, from the paramilitary groups supported by the Islamic Republic in Iraq, stated that according to the agreement, "Hashd al-Shaabi forces will be sent to Tehran University under the title of 'student' and 'for education.'" The publication of this news faced protests from some students, and a group of Tehran University students described the government's acceptance of Hashd al-Shaabi forces as students as a "military invasion of the university," while the Polytechnic Freedom Association of Tehran also described it in a statement as a "new war" to "suppress student protests." Meanwhile, the head of Al-Mustafa International University stated that some current officials in Afghanistan are graduates of this institution. At the same time, some of those introduced as Iraqi students are also seminarians studying at Al-Mustafa International University, which is a religious institution promoting Shia Islam of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and their numbers are also unclear. Al-Mustafa International University was established in 2008 by merging two organizations under the order of Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic. Reports indicate that this center promotes Shia Islam in 60 countries worldwide and is tasked with identifying suitable individuals for Islamic education and sending them to Qom for training. This institution was sanctioned in 2020 by the U.S. Treasury Department for its connections to the military-intelligence activities of the Quds Force of the IRGC. The Canadian government also sanctioned this center for spreading its ideology outside Iran and recruiting foreign paramilitary forces. Officials from the Student Affairs Organization claim that the current capacity of Iran's higher education system can accommodate over 250,000 foreign students, but "political and security factors, consular and residency obstacles, educational quality, and cultural and social limitations" are among the barriers that have complicated the attraction of students from other countries to Iran.