The $20 billion dollars which Western economists estimate are freed up by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's deep cuts of state subsidies will help cushion the country's nuclear program against the slowdown caused by the international sanctions imposed this year by the UN, the US and European countries, DEBKAfile's Iranian sources report. They will also make more cash available for the president's personal political plans. Security forces flood the streets to suppress popular protest. No outsider has seen Saudi King Abdullah, 87, since Dec. 3 when he underwent a second operation, described as "surgery to stabilize several vertebrae on the spinal cord" at the Presbyterian Hospital, New York. His relatives and the royal retinue have taken over a whole hospital wing and the entire Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, but maintained an unbroken silence for 18 days about the king's medical condition. Tehran is already looking ahead to the post-Abdullah era.
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report
Monday, 20 December 2010
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report December 20, 2010, 11:05 AM (GMT+02:00)
Austerity to feed Ahmadinejad's nuclear and pollitical plans
Silence on Saudi King's medical condition stirs interest in Tehran
December 19, 2010, 1:00 PM (GMT+02:00)
King Abdullah - hospitalized indefinitely
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