A Nigerian carrier, Azman, has been fingered in helping to bypass sanctions against the Iranian Aviation Industries by the United States Treasury Department by clandestinely supplying its aircraft.

The Iranian government is believed to be seeking to exploit the decline of US and French influence in sub-Saharan Africa to increase its political, economic, and military influence on the continent.

This expansion began in Burundi, Burkina Faso, and the Republic of Congo, and has now reportedly extended to Nigeria. The US Treasury Department has sanctioned both the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and many Iranian officials due to their support for terrorism, though since the President Joe Biden administration entered office in 2021, the Iranian regime has implemented measures to circumvent the sanctions. For decades, sanctions imposed on the Iranian Aviation Industries were challenging for the regime and its military and civilian entities to bypass.

However, as the Revolutionary Guards expanded their African presence, Mahan Air, Iran’s largest airline, was able to use its connections on the continent to acquire passenger aircraft and business jets from Africa into Iran.

Given the dual-use nature of aircraft, the similarity between civilian aircraft and military variants as well as some interchangeable spare parts, its Africa connection allows the Revolutionary Guards to bypass the US sanctions. Mahan Air, according to the Middle East Forum Observer on its website posted on December 14, 2024, alleged that the Nigerian carrier, “Exploited the negligence of Nigerian authorities to smuggle passenger aircraft.”

It further alleged that on November 15, 2024, Nigerian airline Azman Air delivered an Airbus A340-642 wide-body passenger aircraft to Mahan Air.

“That day, while the aircraft was flying from Kano to Kabul, its crew turned off the Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) transponder at an altitude of 39,000 feet after entering Iranian airspace, though it eventually landed at Tehran’s Mehrabad International Airport.” It further stated that:

“According to an anonymous source from Iran’s Civil Aviation Organisation, Mahan Air subsequently has sought to obtain more Azman Air Airbus A340-642 wide-body passenger aircraft”, adding that on December 11, 2024, French authorities intercepted one such plane at the Châteauroux airport 150 miles south of Paris as it was preparing to fly to Kaduna, where Azman Air intended to store it for several days before changing its registration code and then flying it to Iran.”

Mahan Air operates 22 Airbus A340s, including four leased to Conviasa, the flag carrier of Venezuela.

The A340s are crucial for Mahan Air to transport cargo and passengers to destinations in China and Thailand, as well as to airlift Qods Force personnel, proxies, and weapons to Beirut, and previously to Damascus, Aleppo, and the Russian-Syrian airbase at Hmeimim as well. It noted that the Nigeria example highlights how the US intelligence community must be