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Iran prosecutor warns ministers: no one is immune in anti-corruption probe

Iran’s judiciary and the Rouhani administration appear to be heading for a clash over prosecutors' approach to an effort to tackle corruption.
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With Iran facing more US sanctions and a battered currency, the judiciary is charging aggressively into an anti-corruption probe in the hope that it will help stabilize the economic situation. Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, Iran’s top prosecutor, told reporters on Aug. 15 that the operation will cast a wide net and further remarked, “Any official that needs to be will be summoned, from director generals to managers to deputies and [even] ministers.”

On Aug. 7, Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejei, spokesman for the judiciary, announced the arrest of Ahmad Aragchi, deputy minister for currency at the Central Bank of Iran. He is the highest-ranking official to be arrested in the anti-corruption probe, and as the nephew to Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, he is also the most well known.

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