Coronavirus: epidemic continues to spread in Iran, freeing prisoners

Text by: RFI Follow

According to the latest figures from health authorities, the number of people infected in Iran has further increased, rising from 2,366 people on Tuesday March 3 to 2,922 on Wednesday with 92 dead. But the number of people healed has also increased as more than 500 hospitalized people have left hospitals. Tehran is stepping up measures to control the epidemic.

Publicity

with our correspondent in Tehran, Siavosh Ghazi

Iranian President Hassan Rohani has now announced that almost all of the country's provinces are affected by the epidemic . In recent days, the authorities have stepped up measures to combat the coronavirus . Twenty-four laboratories are now dedicated to diagnostic tests, compared to only two at the start of the health crisis.

In addition, the head of the judicial authority ordered temporary absences for the prisoners. According to the spokesperson for the Ministry of Justice, some 54,000 detainees have already left prisons, representing almost 30% of the country's prison population. Among them, people convicted for political or security reasons.

Nazanine Zagheri, an Iranian-British woman sentenced to prison for " acting against national security ," was tested: she did not contract the coronavirus, the ministry spokesman said.

“Siamak Namazi, an Iranian American dual citizen who was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2016, had slept several cells down the hallway from a prisoner who recently tested positive for coronavirus and was later quarantined” https://t.co/rLV0ZCgD0z

No official confirmation on the fate of Fariba Adelkha and Roland Marchal

However, no news has been given so far on the fate of the Franco-Iranian Fariba Adelkhah and her French friend Roland Marchal , both detained since last summer in Iran.

According to their lawyer Me Saïd Dehghan, their trial opened on Tuesday, March 3 . Only Fariba Adelkha appeared. The Iranian judiciary has not confirmed this information. The justice spokesperson did not say either whether she and / or Roland Marchal were going to benefit from an exit permit or not.

► Read also: Iran: imbroglio around the number of people affected by the coronavirus

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• Iran
• coronavirus
• Justice
• Health and Medicine

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