Rouhani's Deputy: Smuggling of Goods Has Decreased to Ten Billion Dollars

Es'hagh Jahangiri, the first vice president of Iran, says that the smuggling of goods has decreased from 25 billion dollars to ten billion dollars in the year 1395 (2016). According to the official news agency of the Islamic Republic, IRNA, Jahangiri, who also heads the Economic Corruption Combat Headquarters, stated: "In 1395, we focused particularly on smuggling and combating it... Smuggling of goods decreased from 25 billion dollars to 15 billion dollars, and this year friends announced that there has been a further 20 percent reduction from this figure." The first vice president of Hassan Rouhani did not provide further statistics or explanations regarding his claim, but the issue of smuggling has had political dimensions in Iran for nearly two decades. Mehdi Karroubi, the speaker of the sixth parliament in 2001, was the first to report the existence of 33 unauthorized ports controlled by military and law enforcement agencies, which became known in Iranian economic and political discourse as "invisible ports." Recently, economist Saeed Leilaz stated in an interview with ILNA that there are still "ports in Iran" that "no one is allowed to inspect. Or shipments that, based on certain legal provisions, no one is allowed to enter." Leilaz attributed the government's inability to control all entry points in the country to the "dual sovereignty" of the country. According to Ali Tayebnia, the Minister of Economy and Finance, as of Bahman this year, a significant portion of smuggling, meaning over 70 percent, is conducted through unofficial and unmonitored entry points. The Minister of Economy explained to representatives that customs only supervises goods entering through official channels. Tayebnia stated that the government is trying to combat the entry of smuggled goods by "identifying the financial supply lines of smuggling" in order to reduce it. In this context, Iranian parliament representatives voted in December of this year with 150 votes in favor, 22 against, and three abstentions for a request to investigate the process of combating smuggling and to examine government policies in confronting smuggling and the reasons for the ineffectiveness of these policies. Earlier, Hassan Rouhani, without naming any specific institution or organization, said in 1394 (2015): "A corrupt apparatus that... can import smuggled goods does not allow the country to grow." In this context, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the former president of Iran, implicitly referred to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as "brother smugglers" in July 2011. A day after Ahmadinejad's criticism, the commander of the IRGC emphasized that the institution under his command "has military ports like other military institutions, but no commercial transactions are conducted there." Contrary to the government's view that nearly 70 percent of smuggling enters the country through unofficial channels, Brigadier General Iskandar Momeni, the deputy commander of the police force, stated the exact opposite, claiming that 70 percent of smuggling enters through official channels. In this context, the deputy of the IRGC's intelligence promised to announce "important news" regarding the fight against corruption, while denying the arrest of several IRGC members due to "economic corruption." Daily, three thousand containers of smuggled goods enter Iran.