Iran’s ‘Ghost Airlines’: How Regime Insiders Plunder Billions While the Nation’s Economy Craters

Staff WriterSeptember 5, 2025
Iran’s ‘Ghost Airlines’: How Regime Insiders Plunder Billions While the Nation’s Economy Craters
People in Iran are grappling with economic hardships, and officials of the regime have no solutions

People in Iran are grappling with economic hardships, and officials of the regime have no solutions
Written by
Mansoureh Galestan

On August 31, 2025, a member of the Iranian regime’s parliament, Ali Khezrian, exposed a scheme that perfectly encapsulates the nation’s economic decay. He revealed that one Iranian airline with only a single active airplane has 2,500 people on its payroll. In one provincial capital, he noted, 500 of these employees do nothing more than clock in and out each day. This is not an isolated case of mismanagement; it is a microcosm of the systemic kleptocracy that has hollowed out Iran’s economy and put its citizens at risk.

The Absurd Reality of Iran’s Skies
The state of Iran’s aviation industry is a study in dysfunction. Despite having a population just one-fifteenth the size of China’s, Iran has nearly five times as many registered airline companies. While India, with a population of 1.5 billion, operates with just four airlines, Iran’s much smaller market is saturated with dozens of largely non-functional carriers.

This proliferation of “airlines” has not translated into service or safety. The average age of an aircraft in Iran’s fleet is a staggering 28 years, nearly double the global average of 15 years, with some planes still in service after 30 or 40 years. While a world-class carrier like Qatar Airways operates 201 aircraft with an average age of just five years, the typical Iranian airline has only two to five aging planes. The contrast reveals a sector defined not by service, but by systemic decay.

 

The Four Pillars of Aviation Corruption
This bizarre reality is sustained by a framework of corruption designed to enrich regime insiders and fund illicit activities.

The Fuel Subsidy Scam: The primary incentive is a massive fuel subsidy scheme that costs the state over $1 billion annually. Airlines purchase jet fuel at a state-mandated price of 11,300 tomans per liter, while the actual market cost is over 30,000 tomans. This allows them to sell their unused fuel allocation on the black market for a profit of nearly 19,000 tomans per liter—a lucrative business that requires flying as little as possible.

Cheap Loans and Patronage: In an economy with over 40% inflation, regime-connected individuals are granted low-interest loans, sometimes as low as single digits, to establish airlines. These loans are essentially free money, used to create phantom companies that serve as vehicles for patronage, providing no-show jobs to thousands of loyalists. A prime example is the $2.5 billion loan granted to Iran Air from the National Development Fund.

IRGC Involvement: The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is deeply embedded in this racket. Mahan Air, for instance, was established under the guise of a charity and is notoriously linked to the IRGC’s Quds Force, which has used the airline for decades to transport weapons and operatives across the Middle East.

Exploiting Sanctions: The regime actively facilitates the creation of small, paper airlines with minimal oversight. These entities act as front companies to circumvent international sanctions on acquiring aircraft and spare parts. According to Esmail Rabbani, an official at the Civil Aviation Organization, licenses are granted with virtually no scrutiny of the applicants’ aviation experience, institutionalizing corruption and compromising safety.

A Nation Bled Dry, In the Regime’s Own Words
The rot in the aviation sector mirrors a nationwide economic collapse driven by corruption, not merely sanctions. On September 4, 2025, the Supreme Leader’s own mouthpiece, the Kayhan newspaper, admitted that Iran suffers from at least $32 billion in capital flight annually, with an additional $36 billion to $60 billion lost to smuggling. The paper concluded that the country’s currency crisis is not the result of external pressure but a “product of weakness in managing domestic resources and expenditures.”

This admission was echoed by the state-run Arman Melli newspaper, which reported that investment in Iran has been negative for 13 consecutive years, leading to a complete halt in development for critical sectors like water, electricity, and oil infrastructure.

The “ghost airlines” of Iran are more than just a symbol of incompetence. They are a functioning feature of a kleptocratic system designed to plunder national wealth for the benefit of the ruling elite and its repressive apparatus. As the regime’s own media now concedes, the greatest obstacle to Iran’s prosperity is not foreign pressure but the corrupt and predatory network that governs it. For the Iranian people, genuine economic recovery remains impossible until this entire apparatus is dismantled.

 

Iran’s ‘Ghost Airlines’: How Regime Insiders Plunder Billions While the Nation’s Economy Craters

Staff WriterSeptember 5, 2025
Arab-Islamic Committee in Defence of Ashraf
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