DAMASCUS, Oct 30 — Taxi driver Mohammed Kanaan drives his shiny new electric car around Damascus’s rundown streets, hoping for higher profits as spiking petrol prices made his old car too expensive to run.
He is among some in the Syrian capital who are steering towards electric cars — mostly Chinese-made — after repeated fuel shortages during the country’s civil war and petrol price hikes, most recently due to the Middle East war.
“I used to have a car that ran on petrol but lately fuel quality has been low and prices have gone up,” said Kanaan, 42, who had barely been covering his operating costs.
“In the end, I decided to buy an electric car and set up a charging point,” he told AFP.
