The brain drain from Iran can be called another great crisis. Even the media of the mullahs’ regime (Velayat-e-Faqih) report a 100 percent increase in brain drain over the past decade.
Leaving the homeland at the beginning may be considered unpleasant for the mind of any audience. But the unfavorable economic, political, social, and other conditions in some countries are such that the citizens of these countries have no choice but to consider this option and accept it.
One of the dimensions of leaving the homeland is related to the flight of the brains or the community of experts, which has a long history in Iran under religious tyranny. The early years after the overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of the mullahs in Iran and the subsequent eight-year Iran-Iraq war may be considered as a logical reason to justify the emigration of the expert community, or the brain drain.
But in the post-war era, this comes as a surprise because the country has weathered the crisis of war and regime change and is preparing for a period of reconstruction. During this period, according to the natural process in each country, it is expected that the expert community of each country, like other strata, will think about the reconstruction and progress of their country.
But in Iran, under the religious dictatorship after the end of the eight-year war with Iraq, not only are we not seeing a decline in the migration of specialists and brain drain, but we are also witnessing an upward trend in brain drain.
100% increase in brain drain in a decade
According to the state-run media called “Arman Melli” on January 22, 2021, the number of brain drain cases as another critical crisis in Iranian society between 2011 and 2020 has increased by 100%. The number of brain drain cases from Iran according to the “Iranian Immigration Yearbook” in 2019 was equal to 1,301,975 people.
According to the information provided by this body, the countries that are the destination of Iranian specialists and brains are the United Arab Emirates, USA, Canada, Germany, United Kingdom, Turkey, Sweden, Australia, Kuwait, the Netherlands, Qatar, France, Norway, Austria, Denmark, Italy, Iraq, Switzerland, and Belgium.
Iran ranks first in the world in terms of brain drain, and currently about 25 percent of all educated Iranians live in developed countries.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has previously said in a report that Iran ranks first among 91 developing or underdeveloped countries in the world in terms of elite migration. According to statistics from the mullahs’ Parliament and the regime’s Ministry of Education, about 70% of the top ranks in the entrance exam, winners of scientific Olympiads, and scientific medalists leave the country.
Majid Abhari, a sociologist within the regime, puts the figure at up to 80 percent, stating that “60 to 80 percent of the first members of the various Olympiads did not return to the country with the promise of university, scholarships and surplus financial aid.”
On January 22, 2021, in an interview with the state-run website “Arman Melli”, Abhari quoted a historian and Iranologist as saying that “brain drain has damaged the Iranian economy 300 times more in recent years than the Iran-Iraq war.” Or to quote Abdul Khaleq, a World Bank expert, “The cost of brain drain is the equivalent of two times of Iran’s oil revenues.”
250,000 unemployed engineers
On January 19, 2021 Ahmad Khorram, the head of the Building Engineering System Organization, announced the existence of 250,000 unemployed engineers in the country. He did not mention the fact that at the expense of educating these elites of society, what costs have been imposed on the Iranian people. Khorram, earlier, on June 21, 2018, in an interview with ISNA, said about the annual figure of the cost of brain drain from Iran: “$1,500 billion is wasted annually through brain drain.”
But now Abhari, in addition to the widespread unemployment of the educated and elite of the country, introduces corruption as the main cause of brain drain from Iran and says: “When a highly educated person sees that one of the children of high-ranking officials, with a much lower degree, gets a great job, it brings frustration and discrimination to the point that they freeze.”
The statistics on brain drain speak for themselves. What has been said about Iran’s natural resources and wealth during the 42 years of the Velayat-e-Faqih regime is also in front of the eyes of the Iranian people.
The question to consider is whether there is any hope of rectifying this situation, which is destroying Iran’s human and natural wealth, if the country is ruled by the regime of religious tyranny?
“The MEK says the brains are fleeing. “To hell with those who flee, let these university graduates, those who all talk about science and civilization, go.”
These were the words of Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the dictatorship of Velayat-e Faqih in Iran in November 1980, at the beginning of the mullahs’ regime. Today, after 41 years, the brains and elites of Iran are either in prison or on the way to emigrate to other countries.
