TEHRAN — Judiciary Chief Ebrahim Raisi has announced that senior Judiciary officials, including himself, will allocate 20 percent of their monthly salaries for three months to help those affected by the coronavirus outbreak.

Raisi said the decision has been made after Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called on all Iranians to provide sincere assistance to the needy and the poor in the society, Mehr reported.

In a similar move, it was announced on Sunday that top commanders of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) have donated 20 percent of their monthly salary to coronavirus relief efforts

IRGC spokesman Ramezan Sharif said the IRGC commanders have taken part in a countrywide exercise launched by Basij, called “Devout Help”, following a call by Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to help the needy ahead of the holy month of Ramadan.

According to Sharif, the donation will be granted to people who have lost their jobs because of the coronavirus outbreak, Tasnim reported.

He said the donation will continue until the coronavirus crisis is over in Iran.

The government announced last week that it will allocate 50,000 billion rials ($305 million) to Unemployment Insurance Fund to support those who have lost their jobs amid the outbreak of coronavirus.

“To prevent the spread of the virus, applicants are urged to fill out online forms for unemployment benefits at the newly-designed website 'bimebikari.mcls.gov.ir' within 30 days, rather than going personally to the ministry’s bureaus,” the government stated.

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has also agreed with a request by the government to withdraw 1 billion euro from the National Development Fund to contain the highly transmissible coronavirus, the government announced on April 6.

President Hassan Rouhani thanked the Leader for his consent and ordered the money to be spent mostly on purchasing the equipment and goods needed by the Health Ministry from local producers, especially those run by knowledge-based companies.

The president also said the details of the necessary aid to the Unemployment Insurance Fund will be discussed in a session of the government's economic headquarters in future weeks.

The coronavirus, also called COVID-19, initially emerged in China late last year and soon spread across the world.

As of Monday, the total number of people diagnosed with the coronavirus in Iran reached 73,303, of whom 4,585 have died and 45,983 recovered.

Tehran has repeatedly condemned Washington’s sanctions – which were imposed after the U.S. unilaterally withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal in May 2018 – for hampering its fight against the novel coronavirus crisis.

Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has said Iran does not need charity from U.S. President Donald Trump to contain the virus. 

“What we want is for him to STOP preventing Iran from selling oil & other products, buying its needs & making & receiving payments,” Zarif said in a tweet on April 7.

MH/PA