Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards have done very well out of international sanctions — and if a nuclear deal is done in Vienna this week under which those sanctions are lifted, they are likely to do better still.
The Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), created by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini during Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, is more than just a military force. It is also an industrial empire with political clout that has grown exponentially in the last decade, benefiting from the favour of former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, himself a former guardsman and, most recently, from the opportunities created by Western sanctions.
A Western diplomat who follows Iran closely told Reuters that the IRGC’s recent annual turnover from all of its business activities was estimated to be around $10-12 billion.
Iranian officials refuse to reveal the IRGC’s market share, but $12 billion would be around a sixth of Iran’s declared GDP, at current exchange rates.
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