Engineer Arnous: The coercive economic measures are the cause of the suffering of the Syrian people

Government will continue with its support, and our goal is to ensure that it reaches its beneficiaries

Damascus (ST): The Prime Minister, Engineer Hussein Arnous, affirmed that the illegal Western coercive economic measures imposed on Syria are the cause of the suffering of its people, stressing that the policy of subsidy is an essential component of the Syrian economy and there will be no retreat from it, but its forms may vary to ensure that it reaches its beneficiaries.

Engineer Arnous said in an interview with Syria channel that the recent government decision to amend the price of bread and diesel is one of the difficult decisions and one that was studied carefully .

Engineer Arnous clarified that the issue of salary increase was studied over a period of more than six months through economic committees, cabinet committees and bilateral meetings, and the implications of this issue were discussed, and all the government team wanted the increase to be one hundred percent, and some put forward more than that, but this idea  when  studied  by examining the resources and the economic reality in the country,led to a retreat from it.

Engineer Arnous pointed out that this increase, “50 percent for workers and 40 percent for retirees,” cost the state treasury 84 billion pounds.

The Prime Minister stressed that the policy of subsidy is an essential component of economic policy in Syria, and there will be no retreat from it, but its forms may vary and restructure to ensure that it reaches its beneficiaries, indicating that this support does not include only bread and diesel, but rather education, health, medicine, irrigation, agriculture and all aspects, for example the state subsidizes bread daily with 5 to 6 billion pounds, and it will never withdraw the subsidy file, but it will restructure it to reach the eligible segments.

Engineer Arnous pointed out that the United States escalated its economic war on Syria when it tightened the economic siege and unilateral coercive measures and impeded the delivery of the main needs, which reflected negatively on everything related to what the citizen needs, indicating that the so-called “Caesar’s Act” was not the first of these illegal measures nor the last one.

Regarding the electricity situation, Engineer Arnous said in Syria before the war, we had nine thousand megabytes and we reached a stage where we supply electricity to Lebanon and some countries, and despite the terrorists targeting this sector, we have today a generating capacity of five thousand megabytes, 2300 megabytes are operated, and the rest needs fuel and gas, and everyone knows that the Americans and criminal gangs control oil and gas, indicating that the electricity situation is currently declining due to the restoration of many sectors that work on electricity.

On the issue of the exchange rate, Eng. Arnous said that there is coordination between the financial, monetary and economic policy, and this enabled us during this period to stabilize the exchange rate and achieve the goals that we are working to achieve. Many citizens say we stopped loans. We did not stop loans at all and they are available for productive projects, but we strengthened financing. We have strengthened the little one to the limit of 500 million and more than 500 million within a timetable for implementation.

He concluded that hope is great, and our motto for the next stage is hope for action. Under this title, all possibilities will be placed, and therefore there is no fear for Syria, because it has all the elements of the economy, and all it asks for is to lift the injustice of its people and stop the theft of its resources, stressing that Syria’s tomorrow and its future are better because its economy is diversified and its people are strong, resistant, productive and creative.

K.Q