Iran on Saturday announced it would close its land borders with neighboring countries for 15 days to prevent the spread of the Omicron variant of COVID-19, the Xinhua news agency reported.
Ruhollah Latifi, spokesman for Iran's Customs, said Iran's land borders with Turkey, Iraq, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Pakistan and Armenia would be closed for half a month starting Saturday.
Iran's Health Ministry reported 1,121 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, raising the country's total infections to 6,182,905.
The pandemic also claimed 42 lives in the past 24 hours, taking the death toll to 131,348, according to the ministry.
Iran detected its first Omicron case last week, in a traveler who returned from the United Arab Emirates.
Iran has for months wrestled with the worst outbreak in the Middle East of COVID-19.
In a clear sign of the scale of the outbreak in Iran, dozens of top officials have fallen ill, including lawmakers who tested positive and some who have died.
High-profile deaths in Iran from the coronavirus include a member of the council advising the Ayatollah, a former ambassador, a newly-elected member of parliament, an adviser to then-Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and a re-elected member of parliament.
Last month, Iran's Foreign Minister, Hossein Amir Abdollahian, tested positive for coronavirus.
Iran has vaccinated some 60% of its population of roughly 85 million people with two doses of coronavirus vaccines.