Iranian press review: Iranian elite profit billions from oil sanctions

International sanctions against Iran have created lucrative financial channels, generating substantial profits for people linked to the country's security institutions, local media has reported.

Yashar Soltani, an Iranian investigative journalist, alleged that the Ministry of Petroleum has lost control of marketing and exporting the country's national oil industry, handing it to an exclusive network of four brokers who circumvent international sanctions.

Soltani, who has previously been jailed for reporting on financial corruption, said brokers have a strong financial incentive to disrupt political agreements between Tehran and Washington, as lifting sanctions would effectively shut down the networks through which they operate.

According to Soltani, Mohammad Javad Bavand, a former economic deputy at the intelligence organisation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, is overseeing the sale of Iranian oil and has, over the past three months, granted four brokers rights to sell 80 million barrels of oil.

The network has made an estimated $1.5bn from discounts granted on those shipments alone, Soltani said.

In a YouTube interview, he named two of the four brokers, Hossein Shamkhani and Rouhollah Razavi, who he described as close to Iran’s ruling establishment.

Soltani also alleged that, in addition to profits made from government-granted discounts, all four brokers are indebted to the establishment and have failed to fulfil their financial obligations from oil sales.

A further 100 million barrels of oil have also disappeared within the opaque chain, Soltani said, adding that it remains unclear who was given responsibility for selling the oil or what happened to it.

Khabarnameh Amirkabir, a student news network based in Iran that covers developments involving the student movement, has reported that five detained students have been sentenced to death.

In an Instagram post, Khabarnameh Amirkabir identified the students as Omidreza Heydari, 19, Najmeh Amini, 23, Sepehr Amirzadeh, 23, Armin Nourmohammadi, 27, and Ehsan Faridi, 22.

The network added that it believes more students are at risk of execution by the establishment and that it would continue investigating cases involving others facing the same threat.

According to the report, Amirzadeh, Amini and Heydari were arrested in connection with nationwide protests in January. Nourmohammadi and Faridi were arrested over their political activism in 2023 and 2024 respectively.

The students were convicted by Islamic Revolutionary Courts on charges including “collusion against national security”, “insulting the Prophet”, "moharebeh" (waging war against God) and "efsad-e fel-arz" (corruption on earth), according to the report.

Following US and Israeli attacks on Iran in February, activists and human rights organisations warned that the authorities would use executions as a means of suppressing domestic dissent.

In July, Amnesty International reported that since the beginning of 2026, Iranian authorities had executed at least 26 people convicted of offences linked to the January protests, as well as at least 26 others on politically motivated charges.

Despite a proposal by principlist lawmakers to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), some Iranian experts believe the country’s main decision-making bodies have so far concluded that leaving the treaty would harm Iran.

Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh, a diplomatic analyst and former chairman of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, described the proposal by current lawmakers as largely rhetorical, saying the Supreme National Security Council makes decisions on Iran’s nuclear programme.

He also argued that withdrawing from the NPT would harm Iran by helping form an international consensus against the country.

“Leaving the NPT means that Iran could pursue a military nuclear programme, but when there is no such programme, the only effect of this proposal is to make it easier for people like [US President Donald] Trump to achieve a global consensus against Iran,” he was quoted as saying.

Lawmaker Mohammad Seraj is also among those who believe the proposal would harm Iran, arguing that the country has never sought to acquire nuclear weapons. He said leaving the NPT would only be useful if Iran intended to develop nuclear weapons.

One consequence of leaving the NPT, he said, would be losing support from Russia and China.

“If we withdraw from the NPT, it means that we want to pursue nuclear weapons, and as a result we will lose our friends, who may then no longer support us,” he said.

The suspension of international language tests in Iran, due to US sanctions, has created fresh difficulties for ordinary citizens seeking to continue their education or migrate to other countries, the Etemad daily reported.

The daily wrote: “A decision framed as sanctioning the government is, in practice, imposing its costs on citizens who have planned to study or work in another country.”

The IELTS English-language test has been unavailable in Iran since January. Over the past month, the TOEFL, GRE and Duolingo English Test (DET) have also been suspended in the country.

According to Etemad, some Iranians had previously travelled to Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey, where they could enter without obtaining a visa, to sit the exams required for their education and immigration applications.

However, following a new round of US sanctions imposed in August, organisers of the tests have also stopped accepting people who hold Iranian residency, even when they attempt to take the exams outside Iran.

Etemad spoke with citizens affected by the restrictions and reported that they had lost money and time spent preparing to pursue education, employment, or migration opportunities in other countries.

*Iranian press review is a digest of news reports not independently verified as accurate by MEE.