BAKU, Azerbaijan, December 15. Iran Air's debt has risen to 430 trillion rials (about $653 million) over the past 11 years, CEO of the company, Taher Abdolahi, said at a press conference held on the sidelines of the Transport, Logistics, and Related Industries Exhibition in Tehran today, Trend reports.
According to him, this debt was incurred due to the purchase of 16 passenger aircraft, 13 ATRs, two Airbus A330s, and one Airbus A321 passenger aircraft.
Abdolahi noted that IranAir Airlines currently has a total debt of $15 million to the airports of Istanbul, Najaf, Dubai, Jeddah, and Medina. The hiccups with the flight arrangements to Istanbul have been smoothed over, and talks are in full swing to get those flights back in the air next week.
He also said that the sanctions imposed on Iran gradually reduced international flights in the first stage, and eventually flights to European countries stopped completely. Even airlines operating in neighboring countries and interested in transporting Iranian citizens to European countries were not given operating permits.
The corporate representative indicated that despite Iran Air possessing a fleet of 20 passenger aircraft, operational logistics are currently streamlined to facilitate flight operations utilizing merely eight of these assets.
Iran Air is a state-owned company. It's reported that this airline carries seven million passengers per year. In 2024, the U.S., UK, Germany, and France imposed sanctions on this company.
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