Feature: Life getting hard in Syria as Western sanctions start to bite

English.news.cn 2011-11-26 05:54:09 DAMASCUS, Nov. 25 (Xinhua) -- There have been repetitive placatory statements made by senior Syrian officials over the past couple of weeks that the cooking gas crisis would end within few days in the country.

However, the crisis is still unsolvable and has even sent signals that the consequences of the European and American sanctions have started to rebound on the ordinary Syrians not the Syrian President and his inner circle as they have primarily meant to.

Syrians, who had endured several economic slumps in the past, have started to get used to social and economic boom in the country that has begun to take shape throughout the last ten years with the gradual transformation of the Syrian economy from its socialist system to that of an open market.

The looming economic crisis would be the biggest challenge for most Syrians after an era of affluence where consumer and luxurious goods were abundant.

A decade ago, it was not strange to see the Syrians line up and carry buckets of different colors in front of a gas distribution center. But such a scene had almost become non-existent over the past few years.

This unpleasant scene has returned to the country recently and Syrians have started feeling the heat of the EU and US sanctions imposed on the country allegedly for the government's bloody crackdown on protesters who took to streets more than eight months ago demanding reforms and later on calling for the toppling of the Syrian regime.

Syrians complain, especially in Damascus suburbs, of the shortage in diesel, which is indispensable for heating in winter, and the cooking gas.

While standing in the long line to have his buckets refilled with diesel, Hamad Marouf, 46, of Sehnaya area, just outside Damascus, told Xinhua that waiting in line to get diesel has become one of his worst nightmares.

Abu Ali, 65, with big mustache, was standing with seven buckets by his side. He told Xinhua that he has seven houses and that he needs bucket to each house.

At another area in the capital Damascus, a young teenager was sarcastic when Xinhua reporters asked him to lead them to the gas distribution center. "You came late ... if you want a gas cylinder you need to come at 6 a.m. to get a turn because people line up from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. to get one," he said.

Some Syrian officials insist that the shortage in the cooking gas was to be blamed on some greedy distributors of gas cylinders, who hide them to raise prices and capitalize on the crisis.

Last week, Syrian Oil Minister Sufian Allaw stressed that the gas crisis in Syria would end within four days, blaming the recent shortage in gas cylinders that is essential for cooking on threats by armed groups to attack freight trains that transfer gas from the northwestern coastal town of Banias to the gas filling station in the Damascus suburb of Adra.

Allaw, speaking in an interview broadcasted by the Syrian TV, confirmed that two freight trains carrying gas arrived in Adra over the past two days to meet gas needs in Damascus, its suburbs and Quneitra, some 67 km south of Damascus.

He said the Banias train ensures 80 percent of gas needs in Damascus. The minister pointed out that threats of assaulting trains have led to the suspension of train trips from the north to Damascus since two weeks ago, triggering off a decline in the daily output from 65,000 to 40,000 gas cylinders.

Allaw said the ministry has raised the ceiling of daily production to its maximum level to reach between 63000 and 65000 gas cylinders.

On Tuesday, the cabinet convened to discuss the shortage in diesel and to seek "radical solutions" to the crisis, according to Syria's official news agency. A number of solutions were recommended but none has been put into force so far.

Few months ago, the government has, in response to pressing popular demands, lowered the diesel prices from 25 Syrian pounds per litter to 15 pounds, pushing up the consumption of this item and triggering off its smuggling to neighboring countries.

In September, the EU imposed an embargo on crude oil imports from Syria and banned EU firms from new investment in its oil industry.

Syria produces about 350,000 barrels of oil per day as well as 13.5 cubic meters of natural gas. Its daily consumption is much higher than this figure and it used to meet the shortage via importing gas from Egypt.

Syrian economy minister Mohamad Nedal Alchaar told the press recently that the country was going through "the worst crisis in the recent history of Syria.

It's still likely that the crisis would further aggravate when fellow Arab countries fulfill their threats and impose sanctions on Syria for its alleged failure to implement a recent plan recommended by the Arab League to end the eight-month-old crisis in the country.