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Iranian president refuses to supply extra fuel for domestic consumption |
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07:25, July 10, 2007 |
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Monday refused to allow people purchase extra gasoline at higher price when their limitation is exhausted, the official IRNA news agency reported.
"Setting a free (market) price for gasoline at this moment will be like a poison for our economy, this could lead inflation of 100 percent," Ahmadinejad said when meeting reporters who fully covered news pertaining to the first round of the president's provincial trips.
The Iranian government launched a long-delayed fuel rationing plan on June 27, which sparked public fury as well as long lines before gasoline stations across the country.
The country's current rationing policy allows private drivers to buy only 100 liters gasoline per month at subsidized price and taxi drivers 800 liters a month.
Some officials have called on the government to supply more fuel for the market and sell it at higher price or unrestricted price.
The president ruled out the possibility of more gasoline at free price at present, saying "we won't bend to liberalization of the gasoline price ... more than 80 percent of transportation consumes gasoline and we can't allow the market to price it."
But he still let the door of more gasoline supplies in the future open.
"We can do this when we are sure other prices would not increase," Ahmadinejad said.
Last week, officials from Iranian oil ministry said that the rationing policy has reduced Iran's daily gasoline consumption by 6 million litres to 72 million litres since June 27.
Iranian people have faced increasing prices since the UN Security Council issued two sanction resolutions against Tehran's nuclear program.
According to the Iranian government, the inflation rate in last Iranian year soared by 13.5 percent, but some observers said the actual rate was much higher than that.
Prices of basic goods and services have doubled and housing prices have tripled in the past several month, and the rationing policy of fuel has also caused higher prices since it was implemented, according to some media reports.
Source: Xinhua
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