Sanctions have long been in place with Iran, restricting its economic links to the rest of the world, but SBS’s Dateline has found they’re being busted by a lucrative smuggling trade across the country’s borders.
On tonight’s program at 9.30pm on SBS ONE, Fouad Hady reports from Iraq and Oman on those that rely on smuggling electrical appliances, furnishings and food as the only way to scrape a living.
“Being in danger is better than having no food to eat,” one smuggler on the Iraqi border tells Fouad.
Scores of smugglers, known as backpackers, come over the border from Iran to take goods back into the country.
Fouad is shown mobile phone pictures of a procession of people crossing the border at the height of ‘backpacking season’.
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Professor of Economics Dr Khaled Hayder at the university in nearby Sulaymanyah in Iraq says the sanctions are causing significant economic problems for Iran.
“Inflation has reached over 25 per cent… it might exceed 30 per cent in the near future, unemployment is also over 30 per cent,” he says. “The embargo impacted the people, not the Iraqi Government.”
But it’s the trade in oil that is most lucrative and controversial, with stories of tanker drivers even being killed for their cargo.
Although Iran produces oil, the hundreds of tankers crossing from Iraq provide a cheaper alternative to the local prices.
“A couple of days ago, they killed a driver from Irbil. They stabbed him,” says a driver about the dangers of Iraqis taking oil through Iran. “A month ago they killed another one. They stole stuff from the tanker, he came down, they stabbed him.”
And despite the authorities’ attempts to stop Fouad filming, it seems they’re well aware of the smugglers on their doorstep.
