Mohammad Bagher Nobakht added that Iran’s budget for security and military increased by 86 percent between 2013 and 2016.
In Parliament the week before this, Nobakht said: “In 2013, funding for defense and security was $4.9 billion and what the government offered in 2017 budget bill reached $11.2 billion that means the government increased the figure by 128%.”
The day before this, a Member of Parliament – Gholamreza Kateb, said that Iran’s defence budget has increased by 21% in 2017 when compared to the previous year. It has been reported that the military budget for 2016 was $9.7 billion.
After the nuclear deal was signed, members of the ninth and tenth Parliament passed legislation allowing the regime’s military budget to be significantly increased.
On 20th February, MPs adopted the framework of the 2017 budget. Two days later they authorised an amendment that allowed “the budget for strengthening Iran’s defense (to be) increased (by) $1.140 billion.”
In January, the parliament approved plans that (if accepted by the Guardian Council) would oblige the government to allocate a minimum of 5 percent of public funds to the defence budget and also to developing and increasing “missile production capability”. The government would also be obliged to “develop and enhance the ability to produce missiles”, “develop and strengthen the air defense”, “develop and strengthen electronic warfare and cyber defense” and “develop and update capability to produce drones and arming them”. There are also other obligations such as increasing and developing the naval fleet and increasing numbers and strength of Bassij forces.
Source: / ncr-iran /