Revolutionary Guard Commander Says Israel’s Destruction Is Near

Hossein Aghayan, a former director of the supply department of the National Iranian Oil Refining and Distribution Company (NIORDC), says the rise in gasoline consumption is a result of heavily subsidized low prices, ILNA reported on Sunday.

The NIORDC is part of the country’s oil ministry and performs all operations relating to refining and distribution of oil products. 

“One of the reasons for the growth of consumption is that the price is low. When they did not raise the price of gasoline at the right time, they should have expected its consequences,” Aghayan said, noting that if the authorities move to increase the price now, it will have a detrimental effect on an already inflation rate and will lead to increase in prices of other goods.

“If the prices are not raised, the unbridled rising consumption will continue,” Aghayan warned. 

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As part of a populistic approach to the economy, the Islamic Republic sells gasoline at extremely low prices, charging less than 10 US cents per gallon, or less than 3 cents per liter, while neighboring oil-producers have much higher prices, more in line with international market rates.

For years there has been talk of adjusting prices, but since 2018 Iran’s currency has dropped 12-fold and any increase needs to be very big to meaningful in US dollars.

One of the reasons that the Islamic Republic did not manage to increase fuel prices was the fear of triggering more protests, as the country was convulsed by the boldest wave of unrest following the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in September 2022.

In November 2019, a government decision to increase fuel prices by 50–200 percent triggered a cycle of protests and unrest across the country that lasted for over two weeks. During this time, angry protesters torched hundreds of gas stations, banks, and government buildings.

In March, Iran International released a classified document outlining the proceedings of a meeting of various government officials from different departments at the presidential office in late February according to which strategic fuel reserves had dropped to a dangerously low level, forcing major repairs at refineries to be delayed allowing maximum production for the time being.

The meeting decided to advise officials to avoid any public remarks or suggestions that could be interpreted as an intention to raise current fuel prices.

According to Aghayan, the main concern of the authorities at the moment is controlling the supply chain so that long lines would not form at the gas stations across the country. 

He also made several suggestions on how to control the consumption of gasoline, such as stricter rationing plans and decreasing daily quotas for citizens, as well as raising fuel prices more than threefold.

“In the past, we imported super or premium gasoline and mixed it with light naphtha, and there was no problem, but if we want to supply high-quality gasoline, we have to import it,” Aghayan underlined. 

In addition to extremely low prices that do not encourage saving fuel, Iran also faces gasoline and diesel shortages due to a lack of refining capacity. The low prices also lead to millions of liters of fuel being smuggled out of Iran daily, which betrays a large-scale smuggling network. 

The NIORDC head, Jalil Salari, said on Saturday that about 10 million liters of diesel fuel is smuggled out of the country per day, claiming that it is about 10 percent of the country’s total daily production. 

Iran has one of the biggest reserves of oil and natural gas and its economy is chiefly dependent on the revenues from crude oil exports. But due to sanctions and mismanagement it has failed to modernize the energy sector in general, with power shortages most of the year.

Systematic corruption is not something new in Iran's oil-dependent economy but recently criticism is intensifying over the government’s energy management. The situation has been grave in the past several years but since the administration of Ebrahim Raisi assumed office in 2021, the entire energy management system is going haywire even faster, drawing backlash from people and even regime officials.

Russia has also started exporting gasoline and diesel to Iran by rail this year for the first time since it lost its traditional customers over its invasion of Ukraine. 

Since Saturday, workers of the oil, gas and petrochemical industries in Iran startedanother round of strike demanding wage increases in the face of more than 50 percent annual inflation.

This is the first time Issa Zarepour has openly revealed his opposition to removing the restriction on the popular platforms imposed last year after anti-regime protests broke out.

“I am not a decision-maker in this regard; it depends on different conditions... We are looking to empower domestic companies in virtual space,” he said on the sidelines of Eid-ul Fitr prayers on Saturday.

Last week, in a meeting with student activists, President Ebrahim Raisi said that foreign social media would be unblocked if they establish offices in Iran.

The Iranian parliament approved the general outline of a bill last year to restrict internet and access to various apps and platforms. The bill is ironically titled Legislation to Protect Cyberspace Users’ Rights.

The law requires foreign and domestic social-media networks and messaging applications to register with a regulatory and supervisory board that includes representatives of the intelligence ministry and the Revolutionary Guards intelligence organization.

In February, the former head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's intelligence and adviser to its commander also said that the internet has to be restricted because the "enemy" controls it.

Hossein Ta’eb stated that a "hybrid war" is taking place today instead of “bombings and missiles.”

Thousands of websites have been blocked for the past two decades, but after protests last year, the regime expanded its Internet restrictions.

An overwhelming majority of Iranians routinely use circumvention software to go around government blockages.

Hossein Amir-Abdollahian revealed Saturday that the Iranian foreign ministry has agreed to open a section in Albania for Iranian interests through Turkey.

According to IRNA state news agency, as part of a phone call with his Turkish counterpart, Mevlut Cavusoglu, Amir-Abdollahian also thanked the Turkish government for its support in this regard.

Albania terminated its diplomatic relations with Iran in September last September accusing the Islamic Republic of launching cyber-attacks against the country's infrastructure.

Relations between Albania and Iran have been strained for years due to the European country's hosting of the opposition group Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) Organization.

Tirana accused Tehran of carrying out a cyber-attack against Albanian institutions to "paralyze public services and hack data and electronic communications of government systems".

"This extreme response ... is fully proportionate to the gravity and risk of the cyberattack that threatened to paralyze public services, erase digital systems and hack into state records, steal government intranet electronic communication and stir chaos and insecurity in the country," stated Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama.

The attack happened around the time of a MEK conference. In early August, cybersecurity firm Mandiant expressed “moderate confidence” that the attackers were acting in support of Tehran’s efforts to disrupt the MEK conference.

The July 23-24 conference by the dissident group, titled The Free Iran World Summit, was canceled following warnings from local authorities of a possible terrorist threat. Several US lawmakers were also among the invitees.

The meeting which was a nocturnal fast-breaking party during the last week of Ramadan, was attended by the incumbent speaker of the Iranian parliament (Majles) Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who calls himself a neo-con, and his predecessors, Ali Larijani, a moderate conservative politician, ultraconservative Gholam Ali Haddad Adel, whose political stances are aligned with the Paydari Party, and Ali Akbar Nateq-Nouri, another moderate conservative who was once very close to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and served as his chief inspector for several years until 2017.

The meeting was called for by Ghalibaf and was held in his office and is generally believed to have been about the outlook of the parliamentary elections and the challenges facing Iran's conservatives. Interestingly, all four men were presidential candidates in different years.

Some Iranian media including the moderate conservative Khabar Online suspect that the meeting was aimed at coming to some sort of arrangement between various conservative groups, in the absence of other political groups including the reformists who have been barred from taking part in elections in Iran at least since 2020.

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From among the four, Ali Larijani was the only one who told reporters that the meeting did not have any political agenda. Others remained silent.

The IRGC-linked newspaper Javan opined that the speculations about the meeting are the outcome of Iranian reformists' conspiracies. According to Javan, one of the leaders of the reformists has advised his likeminded politicians that "When your political rivals are moving toward some sort of accord, try to magnify their points of differences. Then, without any intervention just sit there and watch them fight and whenever there is a truce, you try to flare up the dispute.”

In the current round of the Majles, Ghalibaf has managed to garner support for his speakership from among the members of Paydari and the Conservatives Coalition Council, a group directly under the supervision of Haddad Adel who also has some influence in Paydari.

Haddad Adel on the other hand, who has helped Ghalibaf to win his role in the Majles, had pushed Ghalibaf aside in the 2017 Presidential election to pave the way for Raisi's victory, but Raisi lost that election to Hassan Rouhani. Nonetheless, the outcome of Haddad Adel's manoeuvres was creating the hegemony of hardliners in all three branches of the government.

The result for the country was the weakening of the Majles, which lost its supervisory power by being committed to support the hardliner government under any circumstances. Ghalibaf's attempts to stop impeachment motions to change cabinet ministers dramatically reduced the motivation of younger politicians to run for a Majles that no longer has a part in running the affairs of the state, Khabar Online wrote.

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Political observers’ take on the issue is that if the next Majles, like the current one, fails to remain independent of the government, this will eventually turn the voters away from any election.

Khabar Online even opined that although there is some sort of tactical alliance between Ghalibaf and Haddad Adel, both relatives of Khamenei, they are unlikely to garner support from Larijani and Nateq-Nouri.

To further undermine the significance of the meeting of the four former presidential candidates, Lawmaker Jalal Mahmoudzadeh told reporters sarcastically that some of those in Raisi's cabinet were also presidential candidates, and you see how they are running the country and what does the country's economy look like under their management.

In a tweet on Thursday, Antony Blinken had said that Washington is firmly committed to disrupting Iran’s military procurement activities.

“We are designating entities from Iran and the People’s Republic of China involved in such destabilizing behavior,” he added.

Kanaani stated in a press release on Sunday that such remarks are “aimed at selling American weapons by fomenting the failed project of Iranophobia and creating division among regional countries.”

He claimed that Iran's military program is solely “defensive and deterrent” in nature and is not directed against any country that would not consider aggression against the Islamic Republic.

Iran has been supplying drones, rockets, missiles and other weapons to a host of militant proxy groups throughout the Middle East, and has sent hundreds of suicide drones to Russia that have been used against Ukraine.

On April 19, US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated six persons and one entity involved in Iran's acquisition of electronic components for its destabilizing military programs.

OFAC has issued multiple rounds of designations targeting Iran's UAV and missile programs, to include elements involved in production, procurement, and proliferation.

“Treasury will continue to enforce its sanctions against Iran’s military procurement efforts that contribute to regional insecurity and global instability,” Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian E. Nelson said recently said.