The Iranian opposition based in Paris says that the Iranian government lies to the world regarding the coronavirus outbreak in the country and that it announced the first infections after two months of pandemic arrival in Iran from China, as Tehran had not stopped the flights between Iran and China, although it was aware of the risks coming from China, the epicenter of the outbreak.
The opposition organization, “People’s Mujahedin of Iran”, said that Iran was the reason of spreading the pandemic in 17 countries including Syria, Lebanon and Iraq.
That was said during an online conference due to the quarantine imposed in most of the countries to limit the outbreak of the fatal virus, and where MENA Research and Study Center received an invitation to attend.
The President of the Judicial Council of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, Dr. Sana Barq Zahedi, said that Iran concealed the virus’s emergence in it, confirming that the Iranian opposition has confirmed information about the virus’s emergence in Iran in December of 2019 and not last February , as the Iranian authorities claim; and this is two months after the actual emergence of the first infection.
“The Iranian regime concealed the fact that the coronavirus started to spread in Iran in late January, because it was planning to organize a demonstration in the anniversary of the revolution on February 11 and to hold the elections on February 23,” our MENA Research and Study Center correspondent quoted Zahedi as saying.
“That blackout led to the outbreak of the virus in several Iranian provinces,” Zahedi added, noting that the Iranian regime refused isolating Qom due to political, religious reasons, turning the city into an epicenter that spreading the virus in Iran and other countries.
According to Zahedi, the Iranian regime maintained its business and economic relations with China despite the virus outbreak there, as Mahan Airways continued its flights to and from China, transporting Chinese goods together with the Coronavirus to Iran and other countries like Syria, Lebanon, and Bahrain.
Zahedi pointed out that in Syria’s Aleppo, Iranian militias are present, who are infected and not being treated in Syria’s hospitals, they will rather be transferred to Iran’s hospitals, according to Zahedi.
“Until March 30, 14,200 people have died by the deadly virus, according to field reports, eye witnesses and medical officials,” Zahedi said.
Zahedi indicated that the Iranian resistance has evidence and reports from the cemetery of Bahchat Zahraa, the largest cemetery in Iran, where the person in charge of this cemetery says the number of those who died by the coronavirus and were buried in this cemetery was 1,250 till March 18, 2020, adding that some infected people are dying and being buried under other reasons.
“More than 100 dead persons are buried in this cemetery on a daily basis, and the authorities have prepared 10,000 new graves for people dying of the coronavirus, which exhausted the people who wash the dead. Moreover, five female washers have been infected,” Zahedi quoted the person in charge of the cemetery as saying.
US sanctions and its effect on the virus outbreak
The Iranian regime claims that the US sanctions imposed on Iran has a big effect on the country’s capability to combat the rapidly spreading virus.
“The regime claims that the international sanctions are the reason behind the lack of medical supplies to prevent, so it attempts to circumvent them at any expense, but this is no more than a claim, having nothing to do with reality, because the regime’s problem is not the sanctions or the money withheld due to them,” Zahedi explains.
He stressed that the sanctions absolutely do not include the field of medicine and medical supplies, on the contrary, the WHO expressed its readiness to provide Iran with all medical supplies from various companies, whereas American officials have repeatedly stressed that the sanctions do not include medicine and medical field, declaring their readiness to provide assistance as well.
Zahedi also talked about the corruption in the health sector even at this critical time of the Iranian people’s life, as the medical supplies are being smuggled by the figures linked to the regime, particularly the Revolutionary Guards, to be sold in the black market at very high prices, and this was stated in the Minister of Health’s message to Rouhani.
