Newspaper that revealed that official coronavirus figures were "one twentieth of the true figure" was seized

The editor-in-chief of a newspaper has announced that he has received a detention order for exposing the inaccuracy of official coronavirus statistics in Iran.

According to official statistics in Iran, 189 more patients died of coronavirus in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of victims to 18,616. According to a spokesman for the Iranian Ministry of Health, with 2,132 new patients, the total number of people infected with coronavirus in Iran has reached 328,844.

The accuracy of the statistics announced by the Islamic Republic, like those of China and Russia, is highly questionable, and based on the available evidence and the contradictions observed in the statistics provided by various institutions, it can be said that accurate information is not being provided about the actual number of infected and dead. The World Health Organization and even the Research Center of the Islamic Consultative Assembly have announced that the actual number of infections and deaths in Iran is many times higher than the official statistics. This is in a situation where severe media censorship is applied in Iran and even questioning the official statistics is dealt with by the responsible authorities.

Newspaper Seized After Disclosure

The "World of Industry" newspaper published an interview with Mohammad Reza Mahboobfar, a member of the National Headquarters for Combating Coronavirus, in which he spoke about the inaccuracy of the statistics published by the Ministry of Health. Mahboobfar had said that the statistics of the Iranian Ministry of Health on the number of infected and deaths from the coronavirus are "one twentieth of the real statistics" and cannot be trusted.

Following this interview, the Iranian Press Supervisory Board, a government body, ordered the closure of the economic newspaper Jahan Sanat on Monday.

In April of this year, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said about the cover-up by the Islamic Republic's officials, saying that Khamenei's lies about the Wuhan virus were endangering people's lives.

Also, the former US representative to Iran said that the Islamic Republic lied to the Iranian people about the spread of the coronavirus.

Source: Voice of America