Iran's trains on the tracks of corruption and wear and tear
More than a hundred people were killed and injured in the latest rail accident in the country, which occurred on the morning of Wednesday, June 8, on the Yazd-Mashhad railway line.
In the latest update on the cause of the accident, Miad Salehi, CEO of Iran Railways, said: "The obstacle created by the excavator on the train's path and the locomotive's excessive speed are known to be the primary factors in the Mashhad-Yazd train accident."
The CEO of Iran Railways also told IRNA: "The driver of an excavator belonging to a private contractor, while the workshop hours had ended, completely abnormally placed part of the excavator or mechanical boom on the line, which caused the accident."
Informed sources told Voice of America that this equipment belonged to "one of the contracting companies under the IRGC's Khatam Al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters."
The Khatam al-Anbia Construction Headquarters, the economic arm of the Revolutionary Guard Corps, has for years become the main contractor for the Iranian government's large-scale economic and industrial projects. This headquarters' scope of activity ranges from oil and gas projects to dam and road construction in Iran. It is an institution that is not accountable to any organ or organization.
The Yazd-Mashhad train accident is the first rail disaster of Ebrahim Raisi's short presidency. Similar tragedies have occurred during the tenures of previous presidents of the Islamic Republic.
Incidents in which the perpetrators or those responsible were never identified and were forgotten after a while.
A number of transportation experts believe that in addition to the corruption in the assignment of construction projects to companies trusted by the Revolutionary Guard without following technical and legal rules and regulations, the deterioration of railway lines and the governments' inattention to improving the condition of the railways have had a significant impact on the railway accidents and disasters in the years after the revolution.
The construction of the Iranian National Railway began in 1927 with the approval of the then parliament and was put into operation in 1935. The route was built based on the standards of the time and as a single track. Experts say: Many of Iran's national railway lines have not yet been made two-way, which has increased the risk of accidents and collisions.
Until the early 20th century and during the Qajar dynasty, Iran's railway lines were limited to the Tehran-Shahr-Rey line, but during the reign of Reza Shah, with his special attention to the development of the country, 140 kilometers of railway lines were built in the country annually, so that in 1320 Iran had 2700 kilometers of railways, and this figure increased to 4567 kilometers by 1357.
In October 1400, during his introduction ceremony as CEO of the Railway Company, Mi'ad Salehi said that we are facing many delays in the areas of policy-making, technical, infrastructure, and technology, and these delays must be compensated. He had promised to upgrade the freight, passenger, and diesel fleets and repair the worn-out ones, a promise that managers before him had made but had not kept.
Before managing the Iranian Railways Company, Mi'ad Salehi was the director of the Quran Radio network and one of Iran's top reciters.
Source: Voice of America
