Iranian short film “Freelodaer” by Elham Mohammadzadeh is scheduled to compete at the 18th edition of the IAWRT Asian Women’s Film Festival 2023.

Directed and produced by Iranian filmmaker Elham Mohammadzadeh, “Freeloader” narrates the story of a fake divorce.

The synopsis of the short film reads, “Leila and Reza get into trouble to get rid of financial problems and face a new challenge.”

Hamoon Seyyedi, Roshanak Khosravi, Sahar Nassaji Kashi, and Vahid Qazi Zahedi are among the cast of the short film.

The 18th IAWRT Asian Women’s Film Festival will be held from 9th – 11th March 2023. IAWRT India organizes this unique Asian women’s film festival each year to mark International Women’s Day.

Launched in 2005, the IAWRT film festival has over the years positioned itself with a conscious effort to showcase narratives weaved by Asian women filmmakers and grown in strength and reputation, with participation from around the world.

Over the last 18 years, the festival has traveled to many Indian cities, and the curated package of films from the festival has been screened at other festivals across the world.

The IAWRT film festival endeavors to showcase work by women filmmakers of Asian origin, from around the world.  /MNA/

Car manufacturing in Iran increased 18 percent during the first nine months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-December 21, 2022), as compared to the same period of time in the past year, according to the data released by the Ministry of Industry, Mining and Trade.

Based on the ministry’s data, 876,000 vehicles were manufactured in the nine-month period of this year, while the figure was 743,000 in the same time span of the previous year.

The highest production during this period was related to the category of passenger cars with 760,000 vehicles, which constitutes 86.7 percent of the total production. This amount of production has grown by 13 percent compared to the output in the first nine months of the past year.

Also, the highest production growth of car manufacturing was recorded in the van sector with 360 percent. As reported, 2,500 vans were manufactured in the nine-month period of this year, while the figure was just 550 vehicles in the same period of time in the previous year.

Manufacturing of buses and minibuses also rose 49 percent to stand at 1,760 vehicles.

Also, 23,000 heavy vehicles were manufactured in the nine-month period, registering about 166 percent growth year on year.

According to the ministry’s report, in the ninth month of this year, about 128,000 cars were manufactured in the country, which is the highest monthly car production in the last five years. This statistic also shows a five percent increase compared to the eighth month.

Two months ago, Abdollah Tavakoli Lahijani, the director-general of the ministry’s car industries office, said: “We can now say that the production trend stabilization has been formed in the country’s automobile industry”, and expressed hope that after the restoration of the production trend, the development of new platforms and the production of quality and competitive products in the car industry of the country should gain more momentum, as this is considered important in the second step of the transformative program of the Ministry of Industry, Mining, and Trade. /T.T/

Iran’s trade with member states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) reached 54.2 million tons worth $34.81 billion.

Latest data released by the Islamic Republic of Iran Customs Administration (IRICA) shows that Iran’s trade with member states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, excluding crude oil exports, reached 54.2 million tons worth $34.81 billion during the first eight months of the current Iranian year (March 21-Nov. 21), registering a 20.45% fall in terms of weight, but a 6.23% rise in terms of value compared with the corresponding period of last year.

The UAE with 15.69 million tons (up 2.51%) worth $15.16 billion (up 16.57%) was Iran’s top trade partner among OIC member states. It was followed by Turkey with 7.32 million tons (down 47.95%) worth $7.21 billion (up 2.86%) and Iraq with 13.31 million tons (down 42.48%) worth $4.78 billion (down 30.04%), Financial Tribune reported.

Iran’s exports to OIC stood at 41.76 million tons worth $17.63 billion during the eight months, registering a 23% decrease in terms of weight, but a 0.47% growth in terms of value year-on-year. /MNA/

Iran’s national karate team topped the 2022 Asian Championship table in the men’s Kumite section in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

The 2022 Asian Karate Championship was held in the capital of Uzbekistan with the participation of athletes from 28 countries.

With two gold and silver medals on the last day of the tournament, Iran finished the 2022 Asian Karate Championships with 7 gold, 7 silver, 20 bronze, and a total of 34 medals.

Iran’s national karate team participated in the tournament with 63 athletes in 54 categories. /MNA/

Over 277,000 jobs have been created for financially-struggling individuals since the beginning of the current [Iranian calendar] year (March 21), Morteza Bakhtiari, head of the Imam Khomeini Relief Foundation, has said.

This year, 50 percent of the employment budget has been allocated to job seekers, he stated, IRNA reported on Saturday.

The Foundation has opened up 277,000 job opportunities for needy individuals, he further said.

The Imam Khomeini Relief Foundation has created over 900,000 job opportunities during the Sixth Five-Year National Development Plan (2016-2021), according to Morteza Bakhtiari, head of the Foundation.

He noted in October that 6,000 elites, 52,000 school students, and about 730,000 college students are under the support of the foundation, which can guarantee the future of the country in various fields of science and technology.

Since the beginning of this year, about 50,000 cases of skill training have been provided to clients, he added.

The Imam Khomeini Relief Foundation has launched 3,285 projects to support job seekers over the first five months of the current Iranian calendar year. /T.T/

Iranian heavy-weight female athlete Fatemeh Barmaki has been selected as the Best Female Athlete in 2022 by International Kurash Association (IKA).

The International Kurash Association announced the different awards corresponding to the year 2022, in which Fatemeh Barmaki of Iran has been chosen as the Best Female Athlete.

Other prizes were awarded in the Best of the Best, such as Umid Esanov, best male athlete (Uzbekistan); Jeong Minwoo, best male coach (Korea); Dilfuza Rakhmatova, best female coach (Uzbekistan); Guy Ambeto, best male referee (Congo); Kayoko Moriyama, best female referee (Japan), Umid Esanov, best technique (Uzbekistan).

Recently, Barmaki won a gold medal in the 13th World Senior Kurash Championship 2022 held at Pune in Maharashtra. She also won the gold medal in the Kurash 2022 competitions held in Tajikistan.

Kurash refers to a number of folk wrestling styles practiced in Central Asia. The English name comes from the term for “wrestling” in some Turkic languages. /MNA/

An Iranian steel manufacturer said that the decrease in other countries’ production has come along with an increase in the number of offers to Iran, adding Western countries have become a market for Iranian steel products.

Speaking to Iranian media on Wednesday, Iranian steel manufacturer Mohammad Saeidi said the country used to be among the top 10 steel-producing countries in recent years, but in November, the country’s steel industry’s ranking increased to seventh place with a production of 2.9 million tons.

Saeidi said that Iran’s volume of produced steel in November exceeded those of Turkey, Germany, and Brazil and its place on the world table moved up to 7th place.

He added that securing the supply of fuel to the steel industry is the main reason for the increase in total steel production volume in the country.

“In November, despite the fact that steel production in the world decreased by 3.7% compared to last year amid energy crises, in Iran we witnessed an 8.5% increase in steel production, which was the highest growth rate among the top 10 steel producers in the world,” the Iranian manufacturer said.

The countries in the European Union faced a 10.1% decrease in steel production due to the energy crisis caused by the shortages of natural gas, while we also witnessed an 11.2% decrease in steel production in other European countries outside the EU.

Saeidi went on to say that for example, the decrease in steel production in Germany during November compared to last year was 7.9%.

He further noted that steel production in the United States also witnessed a 5.5% decrease compared to last year.

The decrease in steel production in other countries has benefitted Iran’s steel industry so that now the country is receiving more export orders from even the EU states. /MNA/

The Iranian Energy Ministry’s Spokesman for the electricity sector Mostafa Rajabi Mashhadi has said the country is currently 90 percent self-sufficient in the electricity industry, IRNA reported.

Pointing to the allocation of 26 trillion rials (about $67.9 million) of credit to knowledge-based companies active in the electricity industry, Rajabi Mashhadi said: “Passing through the difficulties created by the sanctions and the current 90 percent self-sufficiency in the electricity industry is owed to the efforts of knowledge-based companies.” /T.T/

In the wake of the Taliban’s move to suspend education for girls, Iran is ready to host Afghan girl university students, MP Mehdi Esmaeili has said.

In line with philanthropic values, if the Afghan government does not reconsider its decision, the Islamic Republic of Iran will accept Afghan female students, ISNA quoted Esmaeili as saying on Saturday.

“Unfortunately, with the Taliban coming to power in Afghanistan, girls have been deprived of education. This is completely contrary to human rights conventions.”

Iran is hosting millions of Afghan refugees, Esmaeili said, adding that a considerable number of Afghans are studying in Iran.

Some 108,000 students from 117 countries have enrolled in Iranian universities for the current academic year which started September 23.On Friday, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said Iran, as a neighbor of Afghanistan that is interested in peace, stability, and development in the country regrets to hear the news that Afghan girls and women are facing obstacles in studying at universities.

He added that the Islamic Republic of Iran hopes the relevant officials in Afghanistan pave the way for the resumption of education for female school and university studies at all levels so that they can enjoy their right to acquire knowledge and science and play a more effective role in the development and prosperity of the country, according to the Iranian foreign ministry.

Iran is home to over 800,000 registered refugees and some 2.6 million undocumented Afghans. Today, more than 500,000 Afghan children- including undocumented Afghans and those who have newly arrived in Iran following the Taliban-takeover-are benefitting from Iran’s inclusive education policies, one of the most progressive in the world.

Many of the refugees living in Iran are second and third-generation, according to the UNHCR.

Some 108,000 students from 117 countries have enrolled in Iranian universities for the current academic year (started September 23), Mohammad Mohammadi Masoudi, an official with the Ministry of Science, has said.

Twenty-five percent of the foreign students studying in Iranian universities are Afghan nationals, he added.

The students are studying in different fields of science, research and technology, health and medical education, and also in the fields of humanities, Islamic sciences, Persian language and literature, law, fundamentals of Islamic law, management fields, economics, psychology, social sciences, as well as engineering, agricultural sciences, animal sciences, and basic sciences.

In the current school year which began on September 23, about 300,000 new foreign students enrolled in Iranian schools.

For the time being, 560,000 foreign students are studying in schools across the country, Education Minister Yousef Nouri said./T.T/