Budget Ploughs Six Times More Into 'Public Order and Security' Than Water

The Raisi administration’s 2022-23 budget bill has allocated more than 54.8 trillion tomans (US$13bn) to “maintaining public order and security”: 25 times the amount ring-fenced for environmental protection, and six times the budget for addressing the country’s urgent water crisis.

Research by Iran Open Data found the IRGC’s Shahid Ebrahimi program, whose stated mission is to “strengthen security infrastructure”, had received the biggest increase – by about 386 percent – in funding compared to last year.  Large swathes of the budget bill’s Security chapter were given over to discussion of the IRGC’s Intelligence Organization (IRGC-IO), a rival of the MoI. Several entities under IRGC-IO’s control appear more than once, in different sections of the budget, and are set to receive additional funding....