“Smuggling and fuel smuggling”
The Right to Life in the Shadow of Poverty and Border Repression/Sina Yousefi
Kolbari in Kurdish areas, fuel carriers in Balochistan and other forms of informal and risky employment in other border areas, including Azerbaijan, are part of the economic reality of regions that have faced structural poverty, a lack of sustainable job opportunities and deprivation of development opportunities for years. In these regions, a significant part of […]...
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By:
Sina Yousefi
October 23, 2026
From regulating cross-border trade to the right to livelihood; how is support for border residents achieved? / Lohrasb Kohistani
Let’s say a resident of Marivan applies for a border trade quota. He has submitted his residency documents, but the answer is simply: Your conditions were not met. He does not know which document was incomplete, whether the quota capacity was filled or other people had priority. More importantly, he does not know where to […]...
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By:
Lohrasb Kouhestani October 23, 2026
From Regulation to Security: Why Kulbari and Sukhtbari Persist Along Iran’s Borders/ Shabnam Moinipour
The adoption of the Law on the Organisation and Supervision of Border Trade (Kulbari and Maritime Trade) and the Creation of Sustainable Employment for Border Residents in 2024 can be understood as a form of official acknowledgement by the Islamic Republic that kulbari, the practice of carrying goods across borders, cannot be viewed solely through […]...
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By:
Shabnam Moinipour October 23, 2026
Women Kolbars: The Burden of Poverty on Forgotten Shoulders/ Pardis Parsa
Kolbari, a practice most common in the provinces of Kurdistan, Kermanshah, and West Azerbaijan, is a phenomenon tightly intertwined with structural poverty, underdevelopment, and centralized governance policies. The state, through continuous underdevelopment of non-Shia and non-Persian regions, has exacerbated this issue—particularly in the Kurdish border areas. Years of neglect, historical insecurity, and a securitized view […]...
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By:
Pardis Parsa October 23, 2025
“Kulbari and fuel smuggling are the result of lack of social justice in Iran / Bahar Abbasi”
On the fifth day of Esfand month, military forces affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in the border areas of Sistan and Baluchestan province opened fire on a group of Baloch fuel smugglers. As a result, several of the smugglers were killed or injured. The deceased were fuel smugglers who would buy fuel […]...
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By:
Bahar Abbasi March 21, 2021
