Iranian Passport Credit Plummets to Bottom of World Passport Rankings
Based on the world passport credibility rankings for 2020, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s passport has fallen to the position of the sixth least credible passport in the world.
According to information from the Passport Index website, among 199 countries worldwide, the Iranian passport holds the 194th position. After the Iranian passport, the passports of Yemen, Somalia, Syria, and Afghanistan follow. Iraq’s passport is also at the bottom of the rankings.
The main criterion for organizing this list is the number of countries that holders of each passport can travel to without a visa.
According to updated information from the Passport Index website, with an Iranian passport, one can now travel to only five countries without obtaining a visa. These countries are: Turkey, Micronesia, and Haiti. The names of the other two countries have not been disclosed.
Additionally, with an Iranian passport, one can obtain a visa upon arrival in 28 countries, but Iranians still need to obtain a visa to travel to 165 countries worldwide.
Based on this ranking, the passports of countries such as Pakistan, Eritrea, Bangladesh, North Korea, Libya, and Palestinian territories are in a better credibility position compared to the Iranian passport.
The Iranian passport’s placement at position 194 comes at a time when the Iranian passport was ranked at position 101 in 2019.
Two years before that, the Iranian passport’s position among 199 countries was 92, and Iranians could travel to 40 countries worldwide without a visa.
This severely declining trend in Iranian passport credibility is occurring even as one of the slogans of Hassan Rouhani’s administration was to increase the credibility of the Iranian passport.
Previously, Alireza Ebrahimi, a member of the presidium of the parliament’s cultural commission, referring to the fact that Iranian passport credibility has decreased in recent years, said: “Currently, maintaining the dignity and prestige of the Iranian passport has faced challenges, and the strict requirements of other countries for the entry of Iranians into their territories are very severe.”
Iranians could travel without a visa to most European countries, with the exception of a few Eastern European countries, until 1978.
Based on updated information from the Passport Index website for 2020, the passports of Japan and New Zealand jointly hold the first position in the rankings. Japanese citizens can travel to 82 countries with their passport without needing to obtain a visa, and can also obtain a visa upon arrival in 36 other countries.
Finland, Austria, Luxembourg, Ireland, South Korea, Switzerland, and Australia jointly hold the second position among the world’s most credible passports.
Source: Radio Farda
