Capital, provinces shut down as Iran's power shortage deepens
Iran’s capital and several provinces will see a full-day closure of government offices due to a worsening electricity crisis, officials said Monday.
Iran’s capital and several provinces will see a full-day closure of government offices due to a worsening electricity crisis, officials said Monday.
The Tehran governor’s office confirmed all provincial offices will close on Saturday, August 23, as part of energy conservation measures.
The Tehran Electricity Distribution Company also said power would be cut to 100 high-consumption government offices. Provinces including Kerman and North Khorasan declared they would shut down on the same day.
Iranian media reported that the shortages are crippling industrial production and disrupting communications and internet services.
Industry at a standstill
“Units operating three shifts have lost nearly half their shifts entirely," Iran's trade chamber chief Arman Khaleghi told ISNA. "Overall, industries have lost 30 to 60 percent of their production capacity solely due to power shortages."
Khaleghi urged officials to adopt policies of engagement to ease sanctions pressure.
“The country must either engage with the world and leverage regional and international opportunities, or continue oscillating between selling resources to neighbors and importing from them.
This path is neither sustainable nor befitting Iran's economy,” he said.
'Expect internet outages'
The crisis has also taken a toll on daily life.
Dozens of citizens have reported internet disruptions, outages, and slowdowns in recent weeks, compounding the strain from inflation, unemployment, and shortages of power and water.
“We should expect that in the near future, just as we have daily power outages, we’ll also face three-hour daily internet outages,” warned Alireza Rafiei, head of mobile operator Irancell.
He said electricity shortages have rendered backup batteries ineffective, leading to frequent service breakdowns.
“Batteries aren't a viable solution for recurring power cuts, and with such frequent outages, we often can't recharge them. Two hours of daily outages equate to 2 percent of sites being offline 24/7, causing significant dissatisfaction,” Rafiei added.
Sanctions, corruption, and economic mismanagement have deepened the crisis, with Iran’s rial losing more than 90 percent of its value since U.S. sanctions were reimposed in 2018.
Farshchian, 95, passed away on August 9 in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, where he had lived since 1983. His body was returned to his hometown for burial beside the poet Saeb Tabrizi, in accordance with his wishes.
At the funeral, mourners filled the streets as Farshchian’s coffin was carried from the Conservatory of Fine Arts. Culture Minister Seyyed Abbas Salehi praised him as both a “sage of artists” and a creative genius who gave “a special color and flavor to Iranian art.” President Masoud Pezeshkian also issued condolences, underscoring his stature as a national figure.
The tributes highlighted Farshchian’s towering legacy, even as questions over his relationship with the Islamic Republic continue to spark controversy online.
Public reactions
On social media, responses ranged from praise to condemnation.
“He held the hands of those from whose hand the blood of the country’s youth flowed,” one post on X read. “The people’s historical memory never fades. We will neither forgive nor forget.”
“Without a doubt, the Islamic Republic used him for its propaganda, and sadly, he complied and showed no resistance,” another user wrote.
Others defended him: “Farshchian has painted several panels from the Shahnameh, each more beautiful than the other. His beliefs are his own. We don’t have the right to question his art even if we assume he was a government-affiliated artist. Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo were also court artists, serving the monarchy and the Christian Church.”
Themes in Farshchian’s work
His miniatures often explore Shiite traditions, while others interpret Persian literature, including the national epic Shahnameh. He also designed new metal lattice enclosures for Shiite shrines in Mashhad and Karbala.
Farshchian’s works are on permanent display at a museum named after him in Tehran’s Saadabad Palace.
Iran's polarized cultural landscape
Collaboration or opposition to the state carries heavy personal and professional consequences in Iran.
Artists who work with state entities, like television, are often labeled “state-affiliated” by dissidents and exiled communities, while appearing with political leaders can spark backlash.
A notable case is singer Alireza Eftekhari, whose embrace of the populist President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during a concert went viral and provoked outrage among critics, resulting in his isolation in the artistic community and loss of his fans.
Conversely, artists challenging the official narrative risk being blacklisted, banned from work, or imprisoned.
One prominent example was the legendary traditional vocalist Mohammad Reza Shajarian.
He performed a song urging security forces to lay down their weapons during the widespread anti-government protests of 2009. This act of defiance drew the ire of authorities.
The state media banned the broadcast of Shajarian’s songs, image, and his name. Even his iconic Ramadan prayer performance—beloved among religious audiences—was permanently removed from radio and television broadcasts, and he was barred from concerts or album releases.
"Curse the Islamic Republic, which always pits the people against each other … Artists like Farshchian or Shajarian—whatever they may have been—were ultimately artists. The Islamic Republic has even violated the very concept of art and the artist," a post on X stated.
“If tariffs are not adjusted, operators will not be able to invest, and improving internet quality will be impossible,” Alireza Rafiei said on Monday.
In the near future, he said, Iranians should expect scheduled internet outages just like the country's routine power cuts.
Iran’s internet crisis, marked by declining quality, frequent disruptions, and GPS interference, has persisted for two months since the 12-day war with Israel when blackouts rocked the country, affecting everything from tracing the whereabouts of loved ones to online banking and GPS services for businesses dependent on them.
Consumption has steadily increased while tariffs have remained frozen for years, even as electricity, equipment, and operational costs have multiplied, Rafiei added. Without higher rates, he argued, operators cannot invest in upgrades.
Iran ranks among the worst for connectivity
A report by the Internet and Infrastructure Commission of Tehran’s E-Commerce Association last week ranked Iran 97th out of 100 countries in terms of quality, describing the network as “unreliable, restricted and slow.”
Citizens across Iran have told Iran International of widespread issues, saying outages and slow speeds add to the pressure of power cuts, water shortages, inflation, and unemployment.
Government officials have blamed the June war with Israel for worsening connectivity. On July 15, government spokeswoman Fatemeh Mohajerani linked new restrictions to security decisions taken during the conflict, while Communications Minister Sattar Hashemi acknowledged poor quality service earlier in August.
Interference was partly introduced after reports that GPS signals were being used to guide drones, he said.
However, the E-Commerce Association report said that disruptions had been recorded long before the conflict and remain unresolved even two months since its end.
Power cuts and GPS disruptions
Constant electricity blackouts make matters worse as operators cannot recharge backup systems in time, Rafiei said.
“The batteries we use, even in the best case, only work 45 minutes to one hour,” he explained. “With repeated outages, sometimes we don’t even get the chance to recharge them.”
If two hours of daily power cuts accumulate, it means “two percent of sites are permanently off, creating extraordinary dissatisfaction,” added Rafiei.
The crisis has been compounded by widespread GPS disruptions.
Since the war, users continue to report erratic location shifts of hundreds of kilometers, disrupting services such as ride-hailing apps and logistics businesses.
The Iranian government continues to promote its long-term national internet project, designed to tighten control over information flows.
