ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Iran’s prosecutor general said Monday that anyone found interfering in the health system while the country battles a serious outbreak of coronavirus could be found guilty of sowing “corruption on earth,” which carries the death penalty.
At least 66 people have died and 1,501 tested positive for the virus in Iran since February 19 when authorities first acknowledged the outbreak in the central city of Qom.
Many Iranians believe the government failed to take preventative measures in the early days of the outbreak. As a result, the virus has now been detected in 28 of Iran’s 31 provinces.
Health minister Saeed Namaki wrote to President Hassan Rouhani to complain about the serious shortage of equipment for his medical staff. He urged the government to clamp down on the black market networks trading in masks, hand sanitizers, and other medical materials.
Rouhani has ordered the intelligence ministry to track down groups and individuals stockpiling medical equipment and trading it on the black market at inflated prices.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and the Iranian army have been mobilized to deal with the outbreak. Dozens of people have been arrested in recent days for hoarding face masks, hand sanitizer, and other material.
“I thank you and your colleagues for being on the frontline of battling corona,” Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, Iran’s prosecutor general, told the minister of health in a letter dated March 1.
“I inform you that interference in the people’s health system… is not only a crime but it also carries the punishment on par with the crime of corruption on earth.”
Montazeri urged the health minister to refer any cases of “hoarding, withholding sale of sanitizing materials, masks, and other items that are effective in preventing or treating those infected with the corona” to his office to be dealt with in an extraordinary manner.
Iran has executed dozens of people on charges of corruption on earth under article 286 of the Islamic Penal Code for crimes such as “felony against the bodily entity of people, offenses against internal or international security of the state, spreading lies, disruption of the economic system of the state, arson and destruction of properties, distribution of poisonous and bacterial and dangerous materials, and establishment of, or aiding and abetting in, places of corruption and prostitution, [on a scale] that causes severe disruption in the public order of the state and insecurity, or causes harsh damage to the bodily entity of people or public or private properties, or causes distribution of corruption and prostitution on a large scale.”
Since late December when coronavirus was first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan, Iran has become the epicenter of the outbreak spreading across the Middle East.
The number of cases in Iran has sharply increased in recent days. It also has the highest mortality rate of any other country.
On Sunday, health minister Namaki said: “300,000 special teams have been mobilized to go door to door across the country and identify those patients suspected of having the coronavirus.”
“From Tuesday we will go to every house in the country and identify the patients and if necessary, they will be referred to the designated centers,” he added.
