Raeisi: Hitting 40-year trade record shows failure of sanctions
Iranian President Ebrahim Raeisi said hitting a record of $53 billion in trade in the last 40 years in the country indicates the failure of the West’s sanctions.
Addressing a group of people during his two-day visit to the northwestern province of East Azarbaijan on Friday, Raeisi said the volume of the country’s trade over the past decades shows the victory of the Iranian nation and the failure of the U.S. maximum pressure campaign, which did not want to see development in Iran’s production centers.
Iran has been under U.S. sanctions for the past four decades. The sanctions intensified following the U.S. unilateral withdrawal from a 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), in May 2018.
Raeisi said that the country is on the path of progress, assuring the people that the government will do its utmost to make Iran strong. He added that great achievements in the country will be unveiled in the near future.
During his visit to East Azarbaijan Province, the Iranian president unveiled a number of projects, including an important railway project.
The 44km railroad connects the city of Bostanabad to the province’s capital city, Tabriz. It is the second phase of the Tabriz-Mianeh railway project.
The railway project is a major part of Iran’s East-West transport corridor and will play a key role in the country’s plans to accommodate larger volumes of international cargo transit.
The link is part of a larger line that connects the cities of Mianeh and Tabriz via rail, a project for which successive governments in Iran have allocated some 200 trillion rials ($400 million) in investment over the past 20 years.
The Mianeh-Tabriz railway will shorten travel time via rail between the Iranian capital Tehran and Tabriz, a city of nearly two million people, by four hours.
President Raeisi also inaugurated several other projects in the province, including a water transfer project and a power dispatching center.
The president also announced an increase in production in Iran Tractor Manufacturing Company, as well as the revival of the Machine Sazi Tabriz Co., which was on the verge of closure.