Iran offers people £5 a month to stop protests over economic crisis
Iran’s government appears to think that it can solve its worst economic crisis since the 1979 revolution – and the resulting protests – with £5 a month.
Most of the country’s 90 million citizens will be given coupons, aimed at offsetting the burden caused by the elimination of a heavily subsidized exchange rate used to import essential goods.
Government spokesperson, Fatameh Mohajerani, said the plan is meant to ‘preserve households’ purchasing power, controlling inflation and ensuring food security.’
Labor minister Ahmad Maydari confirmed that the money would be issued as coupons redeemable for basic commodities, rather than cash transfers, in an effort to limit price pressures.
Yet, it will likely do little to ease the economic struggles of most Iranians, whose minimum needs cost upward of £150 a month.
And Mohajerani told reporters on Sunday that the policy could raise prices of some essential goods by 20 to 30 percent.
The daily Setareh Sobh described it as an ‘economic gamble,’ warning that similar efforts in the past had failed to stabilize prices and restore public confidence.
In an editorial on Monday, the newspaper said that Iran’s currency has lost roughly 20,000 percent of its value since the 1979 revolution.
‘This devaluation is the result of policies such as hostage-taking, hostility toward the West and Israel, mismanagement and the exclusion of experts from parliament and government,’ it said.
This comes as at least 19 protesters have now been confirmed killed since the beginning of the New Year, including three teenagers.
Another 990 people have been arrested since demonstrations first began on December 28 in Tehran.
Merchants at the capital’s Grand Bazaar – triggered by the collapse of the Iranian rial and the surging inflation – were first to close their shops and take to the streets.
Protests – now in their tenth day – have since spread to 107 cities across Iran, driven by people angered by soaring living costs and opposition to the country’s clerical regime.
The state has reacted with gunfire, mass detentions and intimidation in an attempt to suppress the protesters and discredit the whole movement as a foreign plot.
Footage shared on social media appears to show Islamic Republic security forces in the town of Koushk, near Isfahan, deploying tear gas and crowd-control munitions against protesters.
Trails of fire from projectiles could be seen passing within inches of the demonstrators.
The reports describe the incident as taking place on Sunday night, but Metro cannot independently verify the videos.
Iran’s chief justice Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei said: ‘I instruct the attorney general and prosecutors across the country to act in accordance with the law and with resolve against the rioters and those who support them… and to show no leniency or indulgence.’
He went on to add that Iran ‘listens to the protesters and their criticism, and distinguishes between them and rioters’.
The country has experienced several outbreaks of nationwide protests in recent years, most notably in 2022 over the death in custody of Mahsa Jina Amini over the alleged breach of Iran’s Islamic dress laws for women.
So far, the current demonstrations have not reached the same scale.
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