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Rouhani blames sanctions for Iran's power outages

As Iran swelters with electricity outages, President Hassan Rouhani is pointing to sanctions and arguing for meeting international financing demands that would life them.

ATTA KENARE/AFP via Getty Images
A crow perches on a television antenna in Iran's capital Tehran on June 29, 2021. — ATTA KENARE/AFP via Getty Images

As several Iranian cities were hit by power outages that led to protests, Iranian officials have scrambled to take action and assign blame.

At a cabinet meeting July 7, President Hassan Rouhani talked about the energy needs of the country and plans to increase its energy output through infrastructure investment. However, he said that due to the sanctions that former US President Donald Trump put on Iran, the $4.5 billion in investment that was ready for the energy sector never materialized. He never clarified where the money was supposed to come from.

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