Mohsen Rezaei, Iran’s top security official, made the rare admission on Saturday at a high-level government meeting about how to stabilize the economy after more than seven months of war.
Iran’s currency, the rial, has plummeted since the United States and Israel launched the war on Iran in February. The decline has accelerated sharply in recent weeks, since the United States ratcheted up sanctions and enforced a naval blockade. That has made imports more expensive and deepened a longstanding cost of living crisis that sparked nationwide protests last December that the security forces crushed with deadly force.
Analysts say the U.S. naval blockade has also largely prevented Iran from exporting oil, depriving the country of its main source of revenue and causing a fuel crisis.