Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov. 17
By Umid Niayesh - Trend:
The number of foreign workers in Iran currently stands between 1.5-2.5 million, Hassan Taei, deputy minister for job creation at the Cooperatives, Labor and Social Welfare ministry, said.
However the officials believe that "expelling the foreign workers is not advisable," Taei said, Iran's Mehr news agency reported.
He did not explain why the Islamic Republic officials are against deporting the foreign workers employed in Iran.
It is while Iran's Minister of Cooperative, Labor and Welfare Ali Rabiee said in September that currently six million people are unemployed in Iran.
Most of the foreign workers in Iran are Afghan citizens. They are residing in Tehran, Khorasan Razavi, and Isfahan provinces.
Iranian media outlets say that Afghan workers receive lower wages, which encourages many employers to employ them.
Around 50 percent of the Afghans are living and working in Iran illegally. The illegal workers also do not enjoy the benefits of legal workers, which reduces the costs of employers.
"Currently there are 2 million job opportunities in the country that no one is willing to take," Rabiee said. "The college graduates' unwillingness to do certain jobs has given the opportunity to foreign immigrants to take them."
The Statistical Center of Iran puts the number of Iran's so-called absolute unemployed at 2.5 million.
The center previously announced that the unemployment rate stands at 10.7 percent.
...