Iran rejects Trump's virus aid offer as toll jumps to 1,685

Iranian medical workers setting up a makeshift hospital inside the Iran Mall, northwest of Tehran, on Sunday (March 22) amid the coronavirus outbreak. Iran has been one of the countries worst hit by the Covid-19 illness along with Italy, Spain and China, and the latest fatalities raised the official death toll to 1,685, the health ministry said. - AFP

TEHERAN: Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei said Sunday (March 22) his country would never accept any aid to fight the Covid-19 (coronavirus) from arch-enemy and "charlatans" the United States, as Teheran announced 129 new deaths.

Speaking in a televised address, Khameini charged in a message directed at Washington: "No one trusts you. You are capable of bringing into our country a drug that will keep the virus alive and prevent its eradication."