Leader Urges Iranian Armed Forces to Boost Fight against Coronavirus

TEHRAN (defapress) – Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei instructed the Iranian Armed Forces to bolster the fight against the new coronavirus, known as COVID-19, saying the outbreak of the disease may be "a biological attack".

News ID: 80489

Date: 13 March 2020 - 12:37

In an instruction to Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Hossein Baqeri on Thursday night, Ayatollah Khamenei praised the services of the Armed Forces provided for the people to counter the novel coronavirus and stressed the need to organize the services through establishing "a health and treatment base".

"The division of duties and missions of the organizations and departments of the Armed Forces would be one of the tasks of this base," Ayatollah Khamenei stated.

"It (the health base) should work in full coordination with the administration and the Ministry of Health," the Leader added.

"Given that there is evidence that raises the possibility of this event being a biological attack, this measure can also be an exercise in biological defense and increase national power and might,” the Leader said in the instruction.

The remarks came as the Health Ministry’s spokesman announced on Thursday that the number of coronavirus patients in Iran exceeded 10,000.

Speaking at a daily press conference on Thursday, Kianoosh Jahanpoor said the number of people testing positive for COVID-19 across the country has risen to 10,075 following the detection of 1,075 new cases since Wednesday noon.

He also noted that 3,276 coronavirus patients have recovered from the disease so far and have been discharged from the hospital.

According to Jahanpoor, the coronavirus death toll in Iran now stood at 429 after 75 patients lost their lives since Wednesday, marking the country’s highest daily fatalities since the outbreak of the respiratory disease more than three weeks ago.