FM Zarif:

US wages medical terror against Iranians amidst COVID-19 pandemic

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has once again hit out at the United States for its refusal to lift Iran sanctions amid the deadly coronavirus pandemic, saying that Washington is upgrading its “economic terrorism” to a new level of “medical terror” against Iranians.

News ID: 449815

Date: 30 March 2020 - 10:48

RNA - "US has gone from sabotage & assassinations to waging an economic war & #EconomicTerrorism on Iranians—to #MedicalTerror amidst #covid19iran," Zarif said in a post on his official Twitter account on Sunday.

Iran's top diplomat added that the US "medical terror" against Iranians "even exceeds what would be permissible on battlefield."

Iran's foreign minister then urged the international community to stop supporting "war crimes" committed by the US administration and obeying "immoral and illegal" sanctions against the Iranian nation.

Iran is fighting the novel coronavirus while it is under the most cruel sanctions imposed by the US government.

While many countries in the world have called on Washington to lift the bans at the height of the global pandemic, the administration of Donald Trump is “vengefully” refusing to end its “unlawful and collective punishment”, partly under the pressure of Israeli lobby groups.

Iran is unable to buy medicine and medical equipment due to the US economic sanctions which the Trump administration has been continuously tightening as part of “maximum pressure” on Tehran.

Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said Iran is handling the disease under abnormal conditions because of unilateral US sanctions on the country. “While under sanctions, we have been able to resist well and run the country as good as possible.”

US President Donald Trump reinstated Washington's sanctions on Iran in May 2018 after he unilaterally left the 2015 nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), signed between Iran and major world powers.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) — known as the World Court — has ordered the White House to lift the sanctions it has illegally re-imposed on humanitarian supplies to Iran.

The US claims the bans do not get in the way of food and medicine exports to Iran, but the Islamic Republic says Washington has been working to hamper a Swiss humanitarian channel launched to enable the transfer of commodities to Iran.

Iran's Health Ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour on Sunday reported another 123 deaths, raising Iran's overall death toll to 2,640.

The spokesman said the total number of confirmed cases now stands at 38,309, out of whom 12,391 have recovered and been discharged from hospital.

Jahanpour said 2,901 new cases of infection were confirmed in the 24 hours to Sunday noon.

The new coronavirus’ likely origin was in China late last year and is now spreading across the globe. Worldwide, there have been more than 668,350 confirmed cases of the virus and over 31,000 deaths.

Iran’s UN envoy said on Wednesday that the US sanctions against the country have endangered "the lives of many people not just in Iran, but also across the globe."

“The continuation of the illegal US sanctions on Iran will only negatively affect Iran’s ability to contain the disease. Consequently, the Iranian people will suffer more as a result of this bankrupt policy, as will the other nations on our interconnected planet,” Majid Takht-e Ravanchi said in an opinion piece published by the USA Today.

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