The toiling coal miners of Iran

Faces blackened by coal, these men seem to have stepped out from a bygone era

Iran's coal industry
(Image credit: (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi))

Iran's Mazandaran province is only 80 miles from the country's capital, Tehran. But it is a world away from that modern metropolis.

In Mazandaran's mountains, more than 1,200 men spend their days tunneling deep into the ground to extract thousands of tons of coal each month, an important resource for the country's steel industry.

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Sarah Eberspacher

Sarah Eberspacher is an associate editor at TheWeek.com. She has previously worked as a sports reporter at The Livingston County Daily Press & Argus and The Arizona Republic. She graduated from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.