“There will be no shortage of gasoline and diesel oil,” Georges Brax, member of the Lebanese syndicate of fuel stations owners, said in a statement on Tuesday, as the country is reeling from a fuel crisis and warnings of possible fuel shortages.

Some fuel stations have stopped filling cars with gasoline while others have rationed the distribution of it because the concerned companies have failed to supply them with the required substances, Brax said.

“It is not a monopoly or a willingness not to provide (fuel) for any reason whatsoever,” Brax said in reply to citizens who believe fuel stations are abstaining from selling gasoline because they are engaged in monopoly practices.

“The main reason is that Banque du Liban (BDL) has failed to pay in U.S. dollar for the credits it has previously approved and which represent the price of imported fuel while others represent the price of ships that discharged their cargo in warehouses,” he said.

Therefore, Brax added, “the foreign supplier is refusing to unload fuel from the ships that were newly dispatched to the Lebanese waters before receiving the price of previous goods.”

“The owners of fuel stations are suffering from the crisis and they didn’t cause it,” he said, calling on citizens not to blame them for their rationing practices because heavy losses have been inflected upon them since the onset of the crisis.