Syria central bank head says will defend currency
KUWAIT - Reuters
Supporters of Bashar al-Assad attend a rally in front of the central bank on Jan 20. REUTERS photo
Syria’s central bank will intervene to prop up its currency - which has plunged under the mounting pressure of sanctions and violence - and has the reserves to back that strategy, Kuwaiti state news agency KUNA cited governor Adib Mayaleh as saying yesterday.Mayaleh said the black market exchange rate, which last month hit a record low of about 70 to the dollar, reflected attempts to destabilize Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad is trying to crush an 11-month-old uprising against his rule, the agency reported. “The exchange rate in the parallel market is fictional, and its goal is to provoke fear and panic among citizens,” KUNA quoted him as saying, adding that the bank would be intervening in that market within one week. “The bank’s foreign currency reserves are good, sound.”
Syria kept the official exchange rate close to 50 to the dollar for the first several months of the uprising.
