Iran's plan to build "200,000 houses" in Syria
The vice president of the Tehran Province Real Estate Association says that Tehran and Damascus have signed a memorandum of understanding, based on which Iran will build 200,000 houses in Syria.
According to the ISNA news agency, Iraj Rahbar said in a press conference on Sunday, March 25, that during the 14th Iran-Syria economic summit, a memorandum of understanding was signed between the two countries for the construction of 200,000 housing units.
According to Mr. Rahbar, these houses are to be built in the form of settlements in Damascus.
He did not provide details about the agreement or how the construction of these houses will be financed.
Syria's eight-year civil war has caused widespread damage to the country's infrastructure and population centers and killed hundreds of thousands of people. Iran and Russia have been the main backers of Bashar al-Assad in his government's war against the opposition in Damascus.
The 14th Iran-Syria economic summit was held in Damascus on February 28, with the presence of the First Vice President of Iran and the Prime Minister of Syria.
During this meeting, Syrian Prime Minister Imad Khamis announced that Iranian companies would participate in the construction of "hundreds of thousands of housing units, port development, agriculture, and mobile telephony" in Syria.
During this meeting, Eshaq Jahangiri, Iran's First Vice President, also announced an "important" banking agreement with the country.
Meanwhile, the vice president of the Tehran Province Mass Producers Association said that due to US sanctions, even Syrian banks are not issuing guarantees to Iranian economic activists.
He added: "We have proposed to the government to activate branches of Iranian banks in Syria to operationalize settlement construction in the country so that contractors can easily conduct financial transactions."
SWIFT is the most important international money transfer network, which in November, simultaneously with the start of US sanctions against Iran, cut off services to the Central Bank and a number of banks in the Islamic Republic.
Iran and Syria have signed numerous agreements on investment in oil, electricity, energy, and other industrial sectors.
Meanwhile, the construction of the Latakia power plant began simultaneously with the 14th economic summit between the two countries.
The memorandum of understanding for the construction of this 540-megawatt power plant, worth 411 million euros, was signed on October 1 of this year in the presence of the Iranian and Syrian ministers of energy. The Iranian Power Plant Project Management Group (MAPNA) will establish this power plant.
Iran has provided significant financial assistance to Syria in recent years, including the creation of two credit lines of $1 billion and $3.6 billion for the export of goods to the country.
In October of this year, the US State Department's Iran Task Force released a report stating that the Islamic Republic has spent $16 billion since 2012 to support Bashar al-Assad and his supported groups in Yemen and Iraq.
In 2015, Bloomberg News reported, based on estimates and research, that Tehran spends $6 billion annually on the Assad regime, and in some cases, this aid has amounted to up to $15 billion.
Previously, Yahya Rahim Safavi, the special assistant to the Leader of the Islamic Republic for military affairs, had said in a speech that Iran must "return" the costs it has incurred in Syria through the country's "oil, gas, and phosphate mines."
Many Arab countries that have had tense relations with Syria for the past eight years have recently reopened their embassies in Damascus one after another, emphasizing that they are seeking economic opportunities from the reconstruction of Syria, a matter that has greatly concerned Iran.
A number of Iranian officials have recently implicitly or explicitly expressed their displeasure that Syria is handing over profitable projects to other countries, including Russia, and that the Iranian private sector is benefiting the least from Syria's reconstruction.
Source: Radio Farda
