TEHRAN: An Iranian general has said Israel and the United States were likely to have been behind a cyberattack that interrupted the distribution of fuel at service stations.
Tuesday’s attack “technically” resembles two previous incidents whose perpetrators “were unquestionably our enemies, namely the United States and the Zionist regime,” the Revolutionary Guards’ Gholamreza Jalali said.
“We have analyzed two incidents, the railway accident and the Shahid Rajaei port accident, and we found that they were similar,” Jalali, who heads a civil defense unit responsible for cyber activity, told state television late Saturday.
In July, Iran’s transportation ministry said a “cyber disruption” had affected its computer systems and website, according to Fars news agency.
And in May last year, the Washington Post reported that Israel carried out a cyberattack on the Iranian port of Shahid Rajaei in the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic route for global oil shipments.
Tuesday’s cyberattack caused traffic jams on major arteries in Tehran, where long queues at petrol stations disrupted the flow of traffic.
The oil ministry later took service stations offline so that petrol could be distributed manually, according to the authorities.
President Ebrahim Raisi on Wednesday accused the perpetrators of trying to turn Iran’s people against the leadership of the Islamic republic.
Around 3,200 of the country’s 4,300 service stations have since been reconnected to the central distribution system, the National Oil Products Distribution Company said, quoted Saturday by state news agency IRNA.
Other stations also provide fuel for motorists, but at unsubsidized rates that make it twice as expensive at around five euro cents ($0.06) per liter, the news agency reported.
In a country where petrol flows freely at what are some of the lowest prices in the world, motorists need digital cards issued by the authorities.
The cards entitle holders to a monthly amount of petrol at a subsidized rate and, once the quota has been used up, to buy more expensive at the market rate.
Since 2010, when Iran’s nuclear program was hit by the Stuxnet computer virus, Iran and its arch-foes Israel and the United States have regularly accused each other of cyberattacks.
Iran suspects Israel and US behind fuel cyberattack
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Iran suspects Israel and US behind fuel cyberattack
- Tuesday’s cyberattack caused traffic jams on major arteries in Tehran, where long queues at petrol stations disrupted the flow of traffic
Yemen PM chairs first Cabinet meeting in Aden
- Shaya Al-Zindani’s new government meets a day after he arrived in southern Yemen
- Prime minister promises a broad program of reconstruction, development and modernization
LONDON: Yemeni Prime Minister Shaya Al-Zindani chaired the new government’s first Cabinet meeting in Aden on Thursday.
Al-Zindani arrived on Wednesday in the city in Yemen’s south, which is controlled by forces loyal to the internationally recognized government.
The country’s capital Sanaa in the north remains under the control of Houthi militia, which seized the city in 2014, sparking the civil war.
Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council issued a decree earlier this month to form a new government after the separatist Southern Transitional Council announced it would dissolve following talks in Saudi Arabia.
Al-Zindani, who also holds the role of foreign minister, assembled the 35-member Cabinet, which includes strong representation from the country’s south and east, and three women.
He vowed the government, which has been based in Saudi Arabia, would return to Aden to carry out its work.
Al-Zindani told the meeting that the government was working to launch a broad program focused on reconstruction, development and modernization, Al-Arabiya reported.
He also thanked the Saudi Arabia for its support.
