On the morning of March 9, Li Yi, Deputy Director General of the Foreign Affairs Office of Beijing, visited the Iranian Embassy in China to hand over Mayor Chen Jining's letter to Pirouz Hanachi, Mayor of Tehran, along with supplies that would help the city tackle COVID-19. These supplies were among the first batch of anti-epidemic materials donated by Beijing to its sister cities.
Ambassador Mohammad Keshavarzzadeh thanked Beijing for its strong support to Tehran. Impressed by the sincere help offered by all sectors of the society in China to Iran, he believed that the two countries could cope with the challenges, and hoped that Iran and other countries could learn from China's experience. Mr. Li said Beijing is ready to support Teheran's battle against the epidemic and share its experience with the sister city, and wished for an early victory against the virus for Tehran and for Iran as a whole. He and ambassador Keshavarzzadeh both expressed words of encouragement in Chinese for the two countries and two capital cities.
The recent rapid spread of COVID-19 across Iran has posed an immense challenge to cities including Tehran where supplies essential for the combat against the epidemic are in short supply. The 4,000 boxes of donations from Beijing, weighing 30 tons in total, include protective gowns, shoe covers, medical caps, gloves, and locally developed medical supplies such as nucleic acid testing kits, intelligent temperature detectors, ventilators, and TCM preparations. Each of the boxes bears a label. The Chinese words on it read “Beijing supports Tehran in fight against novel coronavirus,” and the Persian words are a quote from the famous Persian poet Saadi, “True friendship stands out in difficult times.”
The Iranian Embassy in China will ship all the supplies to Tehran. The nucleic acid testing kits have already arrived there, and the rest will follow in succession.
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