In light of the current political turmoil in the Middle East, I've been looking into the effect this may (or may not) have on air safety amongst the regions carriers. Whilst it seems that there is no apparent impact on safety levels so far, as an interesting observation I've come across a rather shocking article related to the poor state of air safety standards in Iran under the head of the Iran Civil Aviation Organization, CAO, Reza Nakhjavani:
خبرآنلاین - All agreed on CAO head dismissal: Roads Minister
Although the story is from before the Arab Spring, it shows shows that there have been plans to replace Reza Nakhjavani as a result of the dangerous deterioration of air safety levels in Iran. At the time the above article was published, the then Minister of Transport of Iran, Hamid Behbahani (
Hamid Behbahani - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
was quoted as saying that "All officials and experts are agreed on the dismissal of Reza Nakhjavani, the head of Iran Civil Aviation Organization (CAO)"