Dr. Hassan Rouhani, today (Thursday, July 24) at the opening ceremony of the Ministry of Petroleum's national projects, which was held by video conference, said: "Today was an honorable day for us, because gas supply was provided for more than 2,800 villages and 21 cities and today we reached the 95% gas supply yardstick throughout the country, which is unparalleled in the world.”

Stating that the gas supply figure is an honor for the administration, he added: "The gas supply figure is an honor for the 11th and 12th administrations, and this will be an answer for those who undermine the administration’s performance."

The President compared gas supply to cities and villages in the country to before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and said: "Before the victory of the Islamic Revolution, it can be said that even in Tehran there was no gas supply, let alone to villages, even in recent years, i.e. the last 20 years. There was no gas supply in the northern neighborhoods of Tehran and other fuels such as liquefied petroleum gas and diesel were used, but in these years a huge transformation and a great deal of work has been done in gas supply.”

Emphasizing that the Iranian nation's rights have been secured in the oil and gas sector, he said: "Our nation's rights have been secured more than ever in the oil and gas sector. These rights, I mean, are places where we had a joint fields with other countries. This means that both we and our neighbor could tap them, these joint fields are limited and their number is limited, when our neighbors use them and we do not use them, it means that part of the rights of the nation is lost.”

"In South Pars, a lot of gas was used by our neighbor Qatar and we could not use it, but today we use as much as them and maybe a little more," he said. “Since 2013, the production of this joint field has increased by a factor of 2.5, which is a big deal. In the case of West Karoon, which we share with Iraq, we use it more than 5 times more than in 2013, which means that we have paid special attention to the rights of the nation over these eight years.”