Avoiding Domestic Debt Default Is Imperative: PBO

Head of the Plan and Budget Organization said the government’s income from selling debt has been used mainly to reimburse bonds sold in the past.
In a note posted on Twitter, Masoud Mirkazemi said the Raisi administration has to pay 5,350 trillion rials ($19 billion) in principal amount plus interest on bonds that mature up until 2026.
“The new government is working to settle payments of previous bonds rather than generate income from bonds [for other needs],” he wrote.
Most of the debt was issued in the past three years when the former government was grappling with unprecedented budget deficits due to tough economic sanctions unleashed by former US president, Donald Trump, in 2018. The brutal coronavirus pandemic made a bad budgetary situation worse.