Qalibaf Says Iran No Longer Has Oil to Use Against 'Enemies'

The Speaker of the Islamic Consultative Assembly, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, alluded to the threats made by former officials of the Islamic Republic to cut oil exports against the West and recalled the current energy imbalance crisis in the country, stating that Iran now has no oil or market to threaten the world with. On Tuesday, December 6, Qalibaf said in an open session of the parliament: "There was a time when, in the face of threats from enemies, we said we would cut off oil to you, and it was our leverage of threat, but today, given this situation, which oil are we going to cut off and which market do we have?" He further clarified that according to the Iranian Minister of Oil, even if production were to occur, the country faces a "transportation problem" for transferring oil. Qalibaf added: "Our issues are more complex than to discuss now whether mazut (in power plants) should be burned or not." Officials from Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government in 2012 threatened the West that if Iran were sanctioned, it would "stop oil exports" to drive global oil prices to "300 dollars" and cause a "crisis" in the global economy. In this context, Rostam Qasemi, the then Minister of Oil, stated in November 2012 that if sanctions continued to increase, Iran would also cut its oil exports to the world. He claimed: "We have prepared a precautionary plan to manage the country without any oil revenue." This threat has not only not materialized in over a decade but Iran has resorted to China for selling oil to global markets, offering extensive discounts. OPEC and the Energy Agency reported a halt in the growth of Iran's oil production. Furthermore, the Islamic Republic's plan to manage the country without oil revenue comes at a time when, since November 2012, the government's debt to the Central Bank due to borrowing to cover budget deficits has increased 38 times, reaching about 500 trillion tomans, and the government's debt to other banks is more than double this amount. During this period, the government has also borrowed 100 billion dollars from the National Development Fund, and overall, according to the International Monetary Fund, government debts have surged to one-third of Iran's total economy. The previous threats by the Islamic Republic to cut oil exports to disrupt the global economy come while Iran, in the early part of the last decade, had daily oil exports of 2.5 million barrels, 18 billion cubic meters of gas exports, and 12 terawatt-hours of electricity exports, but now has 1.6 million barrels of oil smuggling, faced a gas shortage of 64 billion cubic meters last year, and its electricity trade balance has also become zero, facing a massive electricity shortage this summer. Qalibaf stated that the electricity imbalance this summer was 15,000 megawatts and the winter gas shortage last year was 250 million cubic meters, equivalent to 20 percent of the total demand for electricity and gas in the country. He further stated that when consumption grows by 5.5 percent and production grows by only a few tenths of a percent, there is no result other than imbalance. The government has ordered price increases and the closure of offices to cope with the gas shortage. The Islamic Republic's insistence on enriching uranium to supply fuel for nuclear power plants comes at a time when the Bushehr power plant, Iran's only nuclear power plant, contributes only one percent to the country's electricity production and has produced a total of 70 terawatt-hours of electricity over the past decade, which is worth less than 5 billion dollars in regional markets. Ignoring hundreds of billions of dollars in direct sanctions costs, this figure is even less than the cost of building the Bushehr power plant; in other words, over the past decade, the value of electricity produced by the Bushehr power plant is not even equivalent to the cost of its construction. The West accuses Iran of attempting to build a nuclear bomb, a claim that Iran denies, but it is also unwilling to answer questions from the International Atomic Energy Agency regarding its clandestine activities and the origin of uranium particles at its undeclared sites.