US may ‘pluck numbers out of air,’ while Iran publishes truth about dead — Mehr agency

MOSCOW, September 21. /TASS/. The United States may "pluck numbers out of air," when talking about the number of casualties during the anti-government protests, while Iran provides reliable information, Managing Director of Mehr news agency Mohammad Mehdi Rahmati said.

"If we take the official data, the actual number of casualties stands at 3,117, including 2,427 ordinary citizens - they never even took part in any military clashes. That is, we are ready to provide information for fact-checking, because we have passport data, while [US President Donald] Trump simply makes up completely arbitrary figures," Rahmati told a media forum dedicated to the 65th anniversary of the Organization of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA).

Rahmati said that Trump claims there were more casualties sometimes asserting that more than 100,000 people died, and at other times putting the figure at 52,000.

"What he says differs greatly from reality. And you can clearly see the difference is between their approach and ours: they can simply change these figures to suit their own goals, while we are ready to provide accurate information. Because we have the documents. And this is very important in a crisis situation," Rahmati said.

The OANA Media Forum in Moscow is taking place in the year marking the 65th anniversary of the organization, which brings together 41 news agencies from 33 countries. TASS General Director Andrey Kondrashov heads the organization, while TASS Deputy Director General Marat Abulkhatin is OANA’s secretary general.