US Secretary of State was asked about the possibility of sanctions relief and did not rule it out • European powers sent Tehran medical supplies
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was asked Tuesday whether the US is considering the possibility of sanctions relief on Iran due to the spread of the country's corona virus, and replied: "We are reconsidering our policy every day, so will we reconsider it? The answer is - of course. "
Washington has so far refused to ease the sanctions on Tehran, despite international pressure that it has demanded because Iran is one of the most severely affected by the Corona epidemic when the country has thousands of dead and tens of thousands of patients.
In the meantime, for the first time since the US renewed its economic sanctions on Iran as part of the abandonment of the nuclear agreement with Tehran, three European powers - Germany, France and the United Kingdom, under the Corona crisis, have co-sponsored the European mechanism to circumvent the US sanctions. The three countries announced that they had dispatched medical equipment to Iran, one of the most affected countries.
Iranian corona victims are buried in mass graves
Earlier this month, Europeans announced that they would send Iran laboratory testing equipment, protective suits and gloves and give Tehran a € 5 million aid package. It should be noted that two of the superpowers - France and the United Kingdom - suffer from a lack of medical equipment to cope with the dimensions of the plague. Iran, where some 2,900 people of the Corona virus have so far passed away, have accused the US government of "medical terrorism" and called on the international community to violate US sanctions. The US State Department responded by saying that these are lies and that the Iranian regime has billions of dollars in which necessary medical supplies can be purchased.
In some European countries, the highest daily death rates in the past two days since the outbreak of the epidemic were recorded: in Spain 849 died (8,269 died from the onset of the epidemic, 95,000 patients); So far), in Germany the overall death toll has increased to 700 and in Austria 20 new deaths have been recorded (128 to date). In Belgium, the youngest patient in Europe died - a 12-year-old girl who suffered from high fever for three days before her condition worsened. In Portugal, a 14-year-old boy died last week from a 16-year-old young Corona virus in Paris.
Italy yesterday marked a moment of national silence in memory of the thousands of Corona victims in the country. Italy has so far recorded the highest number of deaths in the world. In Italy, 837 Corona patients died yesterday. As a result, the number of plague victims in this country reached 12,428, three times the number of official victims in China where the plague began.
A certain positive trend has been recorded in Italy in recent days: the number of patients requiring respiratory devices has decreased by half compared to the middle of the current month. According to the Italian authorities, the Corona epidemic will hit the country's economy most seriously, causing a 10% negative growth in the first two quarters of the year.
French President Emmanuel Macron announced yesterday that, following the Corona crisis, national and European economic sovereignty must be rebuilt. Macron, whose government is under increasing scrutiny over the treatment of the Corona crisis, has declared that by the end of April, the production of protective masks in factories in France will triple and reach 10 million masks. Orly Airport in southern Paris closed its doors yesterday for an unlimited period. In Paris, only Charles de Gaulle Airport continues to operate in a limited manner.
