Iran is set to highlight its tourist destinations, rich cultural heritage, cuisine and handicrafts in Qatar simultaneously with the AFC Asian Cup games for a month.

Organizers say the event will present a remarkable opportunity to showcase Iran’s diverse cultural treasures and handcrafted wonders to a global audience, notably among football enthusiasts converging for the games.

The simultaneous staging of the exhibition alongside the Asian games offers a unique platform for football fans, players, and visitors from over 24 Asian countries to delve into Iran’s rich tapestry of tourism hotspots and exquisite handicrafts.

Organized by the Touring and Automobile Club of Iran, Iran’s pavilion will be set up at Doha’s Katara Cultural Village from Jan. 12 to Feb. 10, 2024, concurrently with the football games, which will involve 24 national teams.

Authorities responsible for the country’s tourism and cultural heritage state that this opportunity must be effectively utilized. “The goal of this exhibition is to support and enhance the competitiveness of tourism and handicrafts.”

Therefore, it is anticipated that the AFC Asian Cup games would serve as a platform for gathering institutions beyond the realm of the sports industry.

Iran’s pavilion in this exhibition will span 300 square meters. The exhibition plan includes zones and booths with a four-square-meter area and is limited to 12-square-meter stalls.

According to organizers, the event is set to bring airlines, national and regional tourist offices, tour operators, travel agencies, hoteliers, online travel companies, artists, producers, and handicraft sellers under one roof to showcase their offerings to the participants of the Asian competitions.

Additionally, the exhibition comprises workshops, seminars, and informational sessions aimed at sharing knowledge and experiences related to the tourism and culinary industries and other sectors.

The participants in this exhibition can benefit from tax reductions, according to a resolution by Iran’s council of ministers, as one of the incentives for involvement in this program.

The 2023 AFC Asian Cup will be the 18th edition of the AFC Asian Cup, the quadrennial international men’s football championship of Asia organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). It will involve 24 national teams after expansion in 2019, with Qatar as the defending champions.

On 17 October 2022, the AFC announced that the tournament will be held in Qatar. Due to the high summer temperatures in the Persian Gulf, the tournament was postponed to 12 January – 10 February 2024. / T.T/

Iran’s gross domestic product (GDP) including oil grew 7.1 percent in the second quarter of the current Iranian calendar year (June 22-September 22), compared to the second quarter of last year, according to the Statistical Centre of Iran (SCI).

Based on the SCI data, the figure excluding oil increased by 4.2 percent, Tasnim News Agency reported.

As reported, based on the fixed prices in the Iranian year 1390 (ended on March 19, 2012), the country’s GDP stood at 21.9 quadrillion rials (about $43.8 billion) including the oil sector, and at 18.5 quadrillion rials (about $37 billion) excluding the oil sector in the mentioned period.

The SCI data indicate that in the summer of the current Iranian year, the agricultural sector grew by -3.2 percent, the industry and mining sector grew by 8.7 percent and the services sector has grown by 7.5 percent compared to the summer of 1401.

As announced previously by the Central Bank of Iran (CBI), Iran’s GDP including oil grew 6.2 percent in the first quarter of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-June 21), compared to the first quarter of last year. The CBI put the GDP growth at 3.5 percent excluding oil.

According to CBI data, the GDP growth was positive in all four quarters of the previous year so that from the first quarter to the end of the fourth quarter of the said year, the economic growth rate of the country was 1.9 percent, 3.9 percent, 4.9 percent, and 5.3 percent, respectively.

As reported, based on the fixed prices in the Iranian year 1395 (ended on March 20, 2017), the country’s GDP stood at 15.15 quadrillion rials (about $30.3 billion) including the oil sector, and at 13.8 quadrillion rials (about $27.6 billion) excluding the oil sector in the past year.

In early June, the World Bank (WB) in its latest report dubbed “Global Economic Prospects” estimated a 2.2 percent growth for Iran’s economy in 2023, a figure which is higher than the average growth forecast for the global economy and despite the fact that the country is still under sanctions imposed by the United States.

The bank has predicted that due to the contractionary monetary policy adopted by many countries this year, the average economic growth in the world is expected to decrease from 3.1 percent in 2022 to 2.1 percent in 2023.

Based on the WB report, Iran’s GDP grew by 4.7 percent in the last quarter of the previous year, while the average GDP growth for most of the advanced countries like the U.S., China, and many European countries was less than the said figure.

In terms of economic growth, Iran ranked 15th among the world’s 72 major economies in Q4 2022, which means that only 14 countries had higher economic growth than Iran in this period.

Iran’s 4.7 percent GDP growth in Q4 2022 was achieved, while the average economic growth of developed countries was only 1.2 percent in this period.

The U.S. economy grew by only 0.9 percent in the mentioned period, the Eurozone by 1.8 percent and Japan by 0.4 percent.

According to the WB data, Iran’s economy experienced a 2.9 percent growth in 2022; the average growth rate in West Asia and North African economies in 2022 was 5.9 percent. /T.T/

Two Iranian films have won awards at the 43rd Paladino d’Oro Sport Film Festival, in Agrigento, Italy, the organizers announced on Tuesday.

“The Breath”, a documentary by Behzad Rezaei, received Best Other Cinema Award, while “Unnamed”, a short documentary by Iranmerhr Salimi, won the School Award of the festival.

“The Breath” depicts the loneliness and lack of communication between people during the Corona pandemic era and its impact on personal life, solitude and creativity of artists in different countries of the world.

“Unnamed” revolves around the life of Zeinab, a talented volleyball player, who chooses to undergo a gender transition as she feels that her spirit aligns more with the male gender. However, in doing so, she is aware of the severe repercussions, including the end of her successful career due to her short stature and the loss of her sole source of income, which could potentially jeopardize her family’s future.

Moreover, Iranian film “Punch Drunk” by Adel Tabrizi was also nominated in three categories including the Best Film, Best Director, and Best Screenplay, but failed to win.

Set in Tehran in 1996, the story of the film follows Mahtab who lives along with her 10-year-old child, Erfan. She is divorced from her husband, Morteza, who is in jail. Mahtab has enrolled her child in a karate class so that he does not end up like his father as far as his character is concerned. Erfan’s only interest is cinema and could not care less about sports. Hassan Khoshnud, the tough and serious karate instructor with his dictatorial methods causes Erfan to run away one day from the karate academy in the middle of exercises.

The tragicomedy won the best screenplay award at the 16th Cheboksary International Film Festival in Russia in June.

The cast includes Behrang Alavi, Hamed Behdad, Baran Kosari, Nader Soleimani, and Siavash Cheraghipour among others.

Over 150 short and feature films from 39 countries were in competition at this year’s edition of the festival, including Iran, Brazil, China, India, Russia, the U.S., and almost all of Europe.

In addition to the movie screening, the festival also included meetings with producers, directors and actors and the “Sport, cinema and medicine” conference.

Launched in 1979, the Paladino d’Oro Sport Film Festival is the oldest in the world of sports cinema, which promotes the diffusion of sports films and videos. The festival seeks to promote the best quality of sports image productions; organize meetings between productions, film distributors and mass media, and be a teaching tool for schools and universities.

Golden Paladin is the Sport Film Festival Award. The Paladino d’oro is awarded by the sports film academy, made up of illustrious personalities from cinema, journalism and sport. /T.T/

Saleh Abazari from Iran managed to win the gold medal in the 2023 Karate 1-Series in Portugal. Abazari defeated Sajjad Ganjzadeh, who was also from Iran, 6-2 in the +84 kg weight category and stood in the first place of the weight.

The 2023 Karate 1-Series in Portugal was participated by 1003 karatekas from 72 countries in Portugal’s Matosinhos city.  /MNA/

The first image of the Daylaman destroyer built by the military experts at the Iranian Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces Logistics which will soon join the Navy fleet, has been released.​

According to the announcement of Brigadier General Mohammadreza Ashtiani, the Minister of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics, the unveiling and joining of the destroyer to the Navy is scheduled to take place on the occasion of Navy Day.

This destroyer is one of the Mowj class destroyers with a weight of 1500 tons, which has many advantages over the previous variants.  /MNA/

A total of seven Iranian productions will participate in the 3rd Red Sea International Film Festival in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, from November 30 to December 9. Three feature films, two short films, one animation and one series are the works from Iran included in the festival lineup, ISNA reported.

“Roxana” written and directed by Parviz Shahbazi will represent Iran in the main competition section. It is the story of a young gambler who finds an unexpected romance with a talented girl artist. Determined to turn his life around, he strives to become a better, more useful person.

Mahsa Akbarabadi, Yasna Mirtahmasb, Maedeh Tahmasbi, Behrang Alavi, Rambod Motalebi, Niloofar Kookhani, and Shahram Abdoli are in the cast.

In its world premiere at the 36th Tokyo International Film Festival in October, the film won the Best Actor Award for Yasna Mirtahmasb.

Competing in the Shorts Competition section, two short flicks from Iran will vie for the award, including “Suitcase” by Saman Hosseinpour and Ako Zand-Karimi and “Titanic, Suitable Version for Iranian Families” by Farnoosh Samadi.

“Suitcase” is about a Kurdish refugee who lives in his suitcase far from his own homeland. In it he carries memories of his family. When someone steals the suitcase in the tumult of the foreign city center, he loses his home a second time.

The 15-minute flick won the best script award at the 11th Parma International Music Film Festival in Italy and the Audience Award at Kobani International Film Festival in Germany in September.

Meysam Damanzeh, Rezvan Khodami, Elena Sahami and Ava Moslemkhani are in the cast of the short work.

Samadi’s short film depicts a complex and combative exchange at an Iranian broadcaster over a certain Hollywood blockbuster, which disguises deeper ruptures.

The cast includes Sadaf Asgari, Hamed Advay, Mohammad Heidari, Amirreza Rajbaran, Melika Pazouki, Mojtaba Batvandi, Mohammad Asna, and Behnaz Jafari.

“The Last Snow” by Amirhossein Asgari will be screened at the Festival Favorites section. It is about Yousef, a successful and committed veterinarian who lives in a village. When his daughter’s friend, Khorshid, disappears, all the villagers look for her sympathetically until a secret is revealed.

Premiered at the 40th Fajr Film Festival, it earned 9 nominations, winning 4 awards. Amin Hayai, Ladan Mostofi, Majid Salehi, Nooshin Masoudian, Mohammad Sadegh Malek, and Mehdi Mehraban are in the cast among others.

The animated movie “3 Little Kungpoo Goats” by Kianoush and Farzad Dalvand and feature film “Captain” by Mohammad Hamzei are the Iranian works in the Families and Children section of the Red Sea Festival.

A joint production of Iran and China, the animation shows a jungle where there is a fragile ceasefire between predators and preys. One day the wolf who is exhausted by vegetarian recipes decided to find a legal detour to hunt some little goats without breaking the truce. But he doesn’t know that these little goats are the students of the Martial School that trains self-defense to little animals.

“Captain” revolves around an 11-year-old boy named Isa who is absolutely convinced that he will soon be playing for the Iran national football team. Nothing can shake his confidence. Not even the fact that he lives in the cancer section of a hospital and gets weaker from treatment to treatment.

Pejman Bazeghi, Pante’a Panahiha, Amirhossein Bayat, Bahar Nouhian, Arghavan Shabani, Shayan Deramipour, and Parham Gholamlou play in the 90-minute film deals with the themes of hope and forgiveness.

The series “Actor” written and directed by Nima Javidi is also present in the Series section of the event.

Blending drama, mystery and black comedy, the series is a dazzling story about two impecunious actors Ali and Morteza who turn the world into their scene. The duo put their acting talents to original use, hopping from a staged marriage proposal to a graduation ceremony, via an array of receptions and functions. But things don’t always go as planned as they find themselves in increasingly daring and dangerous situations, while simultaneously trying to deal with the problems in their own lives.

The cast includes Navid Mohammadzadeh, Ahmad Mehranfar, Hasti Mahdavifar, Hanieh Tavassoli, Hooman Barghnavard, Gelareh Abbasi, Arash Falahatpisheh, Roya Javidnia, Mehraveh Sharifinia, and Farideh Sepahmansour among others.

The series has so far received an honorable mention from Seriencamp Festival in Germany earlier this year in June and the grand prize of Series Mania Festival in France in March. It also won the best screenwriter award at the 18th Seoul International Drama Awards in South Korea in September.

Launched in 2019, the Red Sea International Film Festival mainly focuses on new storytelling trends, as well as emerging talents from Saudi Arabia, the Arab world, the West Asia, and the rest of the Global South. /T.T/

Alireza Nasiri of Iran claimed a gold medal at the 2023 Junior World Weightlifting Championships. He came first in the 96kg weight class after lifting a total of 371kg (166+205) in the tournament.

Turkmenistan’s Shahzadbek Matyakubov seized the silver with 367kg and Masashi Nishikawa of Japan won the bronze with 362kg.

The competition has started in Guadalajara, Mexico on Nov. 15 and will run until Nov. 23.

The 2023 Junior World Weightlifting Championships have brought together 229 athletes from 44 countries. /T.T/

Iran is the largest wheat producer in the world in 2023, producing 14 million tons of wheat, according to the statistics of the US Department of Agriculture.

In its latest report on the situation of grain production in the world, the department said Iran produced over 14 million tons of wheat in the 2023 Crop Year, showing an 800,000-ton hike compared to the same period last year.

Iran’s wheat production in 2023 registered a six percent growth compared to last year’s corresponding period, the report added.

Iran had produced 13.2 million tons of wheat in 2022.

In 2023 countries in the world produced 782 million tons of wheat in total, indicating a seven million tons slump compared to a year earlier.

China became the world’s biggest wheat producer in 2023, producing more than 137 million tons of wheat in this period, followed by the European Union and India. /MNA/

The president of the University of Tehran (UT) has said that establishing a branch of the university in India is one of the plans of the university in line with the expansion of the university program.

The President of the University of Tehran (UT) Seyyed Mohammad Moqimi made the comments in a meeting with the Indian Ambassador Rudra Gaurav Shresth in Tehran on Tuesday.

Referring to the cultural similarities between Iran and India, the UT president emphasized the need to develop scientific, academic, economic and political relations between the two countries.

“The University of Tehran is developing international cooperation with considering neighboring countries that share common viewpoints with the Islamic Republic of Iran as a priority,” Moqimi said, adding that, “In this regard, we have started activities to set up Tehran University branch in Iraq and we have made agreements with Iraqi governmental and non-governmental sectors in order to set up Tehran University branch in different cities of Iraq.”

The UT President of Tehran University further stated that holy Najaf is the first city targeted in Iraq for the establishment of the first branch of the University in the neighboring country, adding that, “In Syria, we have also started a joint cooperation with Damascus University in order to establish a branch of Tehran University in that country. Also, at the Georgia branch of Tehran University, we are going to enroll students from February 2024.”

Referring to the experience of holding seven meetings of presidents of major Iranian and Russian universities in Tehran and Moscow, he announced the planning to create the same experience between the major universities of Iran and China, with the two universities of Tehran and Nanjing at the center of the activities, and by proposing to hold a meeting of presidents of universities between Iran and India.

“I suggest that a joint university parliament be formed between major universities of Iran and India, its secretariat should be located in Tehran University,” Moqimi added.

The ambassador of India Shresth, for his part, welcomed the suggestion to establish the branch of Tehran University in India, and considered the idea of the president of Tehran University to establish a joint university parliament between India and Iran as a promising idea for progress in bilateral cooperation. /MNA/

Iran has moved from 15th to 13th in the global ranking of scientific production in the agricultural sector, according to the deputy minister of agriculture.

Mojtaba Khayyam Nekouei, who also heads the Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Organization (AREEO), said this on Monday, adding that scientific productions are important in the agricultural sector.

He described the sustainability of food security in the country as the most important goal in the agricultural sector, stating that becoming knowledge-based and increasing productivity are the most important components of food security.

He said more than 25 percent of the scientific productions of the country in the agricultural sector belong to the AREEO, the outcome of which can be witnessed in boosting agricultural production.

Currently, Iran stands at the first rank in the West Asia region in terms of scientific production in the field of agriculture, Khayyam Nekouei said, adding that the speed of scientific production should be accelerated in order to attain the appropriate scientific status in the international arena.

Turning to Iran’s accession to international treaties including the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), he noted that Iran can become an authentic scientific source in the agricultural sector in SCO and ECO member states. / MNA/