IRNA: Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has returned 1100 historical tablets from New York as he came back home after attending the UN General Assembly meeting in the US city.

The historical tablets belong to Darius I, also known as Darius the Great, who ruled the Achaemenid Empire in the 5th century BC.

The return of the tablets takes place following the intensive negotiations of Iran’s ministries of foreign affairs and cultural heritage and the legal department of the presidential office with the Institute of Oriental Studies at the University of Chicago.

These tablets are often written in cuneiform and in Elamite or Aramaic language in different shapes and sizes, and their subjects are mainly related to the management of resources, roads, social relations, basic necessities of life, wages and the economy of the Achaemenid society during Darius I.

Cuneiform is a writing system that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East.

Iranian athletes have secured twelve medals, ranking 21st at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, France.

The Iranian athletes concluded their participation in this summer’s Olympics with a total of twelve medals comprising three gold, six silver, and three bronze.

In Greco-Roman wrestling, Saeed Esmaeili and Mohammad-Hadi Saravi each won gold in the 67 kg and 97 kg categories respectively. Alireza Mohmadi also won silver in the 87 kg category.

In freestyle wrestling, Hassan Yazdani (86kg), Amir-Hossein Zare (125kg), and Rahman Amouzad (65 kg) each earned a silver medal.

Additionally, Taekwondo practitioner Arian Salimi (+80kg) claimed a gold medal for Iran. Taekwondo athletes Mehran Barkhordari (-82 kg) and Nahid Kiani (-57 kg) each took home a silver medal.

Furthermore, Mobina Nematzadeh (-49 kg) in Taekwondo, Amin Mirzazadeh (130 kg) in Greco-Roman wrestling, and Amir-Ali Azarpira (97 kg) in Freestyle wrestling each won bronze medals.

The Iranian sports delegation took part in the 33rd edition of the Olympic Games in Paris, fielding 40 athletes across 14 disciplines.

They concluded their participation in the Paris 2024 Olympics with a 21st-place finish, ascending six ranks from their previous performance in Tokyo.

In the preceding Tokyo Games in 2021, the Iranian team secured three gold, two silver, and two bronze medals.

The 33rd Olympic Games in Paris, which kicked off with the opening ceremony on July 26, officially came to a close on August 11.

Masoud Pezeshkian was elected as Iran’s new president.

Pezeshkian won the election race by securing 16.384.403 of the votes while Saeed Jalili, his rival, managed to secure 13.538.179 of the votes, according to an announcement made by Mohsen Eslami, spokesperson for Iran’s election headquarters.

Masoud Pezeshkian and Saeed Jalili were the two candidates who secured the most votes in the snap presidential election on June 28.

The gap between the two candidates was more than two million votes in the end.

Pezeshkian would replace Ebrahim Raeisi, who embraced martyrdom during a helicopter crash in Iran’s northwestern mountainous region on May 19.

Pres. elect Pezeshkian asks for unity, continued support

Iran’s president-elect Masoud Pezeshkian says he will “extend the hand of friendship to everyone” in his first remarks since being declared winner of a runoff vote against former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili.

“We will extend the hand of friendship to everyone; we are all people of this country; we should use everyone for the progress of the country,” Pezeshkian said on national television on Saturday after winning the election runoff, according to Press TV.

Later, he took to X to thank the Iranian people for putting their trust in him, pledging not to let them.

“Dear people of Iran, the elections are over and this is just the beginning of our togetherness. The difficult path ahead will not be smooth except with your companionship, empathy and trust. I extend my hand to you and I swear on my honor that I will not leave you alone on this path. Don’t leave me alone.”

Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi also thanked the people for their participation in the vote and congratulated Pezeshkian on the victory.

“Thanks God, the 14th presidential election ended in full security, soundness and serious competition of candidates and the participation of over 30 million people of Iran, and the ninth president of Iran was elected.

“Mr. Masoud Pezeshkian was elected as the head of the 14th government, and I would like to congratulate him,” he said.

Vahidi touched on wrong analyses and efforts made to suggest that elections in Iran had no meaning, saying the results put the seal on the invalidity of such claims.

He thanked everyone who worked to create a positive atmosphere, foremost the people for their participation and Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei “who defined a framework based on the four components of security, health, competition and participation and facilitated the election process with his guidelines”.

The minister also thanked senior clerics for recommending people to vote as well as families of martyrs, especially late President Ebrahim Raeisi.

“The government of Ayatollah Raeisi was true to his promise and we learned from him to work within the framework of the intentions of the Eminent Leader of the Revolution.”

Who is Iran’s new president Masoud Pezeshkian?

Get to know Iran’s newly-elected president, Masoud Pezeshkian.

Masoud Pezeshkian is an Iranian reformist politician who represented Tabriz, Osku, and Azarshahr electoral district in the Parliament of Iran, and also served as its First Deputy Speaker from 2016 to 2020.

He was Minister of Health between 2001 and 2005 under President Mohammad Khatami.

A cardiac surgeon by training, Pezeshkian previously also served as the chancellor of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences and currently is a member of the academic staff at the prestigious university in northern Iran.

He previously ran for the presidency in 2013 and 2021 but both times failed to make headway.

Pezeshkian officially joined the campaign for the top executive office on June 1, the third day of registration, at the Interior Ministry in Tehran, accompanied by a group of supporters.

Statistics of the Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade said that export of petrochemicals and gas condensates in the first four months of the current year (from March 21 to July 23) increased 38.8 percent.

In this period, the export of petrochemicals and gas condensates registered a 38.8 percent hike as compared to the same period of last year.

Another statistic indicated that Iran’s export of handwoven carpets and handicrafts registered a 4.7 percent growth from March 21 to July 23.

Over 35.7 million tons of products, valued at $17.3 billion, were exported from the country, showing a 6.4 percent decline and also a 22 percent hike in weight and value respectively.

Accordingly, the imports of non-oil goods into the country showed a 12.2 percent decline and a 16.8 percent hike in weight and value respectively, the report added.

Based on the report of the ministry country’s foreign trade value in the first four months of the current year hit about $28.9 billion, the rate of which stood at about $36.5 billion in the last year’s corresponding period.

Iran’s national futsal team, after accepting defeat against Japan in the final of 16th edition of the Asian Futsal Cup, failed to repeat the championship title in this competition, and Japanese team won the cup for 4th time.

The final match of the 16th Asian Futsal Championship was held between the two powerful teams of Iran and Japan, and in the end, it was the Japanese team that won the championship title.

In this match, which was held at the Saad Al-Abdullah Sport Hall Complex in Kuwait at 20:30 (local time), Japan defeated Iran, the most honored team of Asia, 3-2 and crowned the title of championship.

In this edition of the competitions, Iran national futsal team reached the final without losing and lost against Japan.

Iran trounced Vietnam in the quarterfinal of AFC Futsal Asian Cup 8-1 on Tuesday.

In the semi-final, Iran National Futsal Team defeated Thailand 5-0.

Final Match Report of AFC Futsal Asian Cup 2022

Iran, who had scored 37 goals en route to reaching the final, started as aggressively as ever with Hossein Tayebi and Alireza Rafiei Pour making early attempts at goal.

As head coach Kenichiro Kogure had anticipated, Japan were forced to play defence against Iran’s incessant pressure, with their best chances coming from counter-attacks and set-pieces.

Japan captain Arthur Oliveira, however, nearly stunned the defending champions in the eighth minute when his attempt off Soma Mizutani’s pass rocked the crossbar.

Iran almost paid a price again for their aggression a minute later after committing a foul at the edge of the box, but Oliveira’s free-kick was superbly saved by Saied Momeni.

Iran, however, continued to play their style of attacking futsal and after 15 minutes of testing Guilherme Kuromoto, Saied Ahmad Abbasi collected Mahdi Karimi’s pass and let loose a superb shot into the bottom right corner to open the scoring.

Japan, the only other team to have won the AFC Futsal Asian Cup, were unfazed and drew level a minute later when Mohammedhossein Derakhshani failed to intercept Kuromoto’s long-range throw into the final third, allowing Kazuya Shimizu to equalise with a brilliant right-footed shot.

Iran looked to close the first half strongly but Tayebi and Abbasi’s efforts were denied by Kuromoto’s quick reflexes as both sides entered the halftime break with the title still very much up for grabs.
Iran’s waves of attacks continued in the opening minutes of the second half with Abbasi and Moslem Oladghobad forcing parries out of Kuromoto in the opening minutes but Rafiei Pour’s foul on Shimizu in the 27th minute gave Japan a lifeline.

Oliveira stepped up to take the free-kick and the skipper made no mistake as he smashed his effort home to put Japan ahead for the first time.
The goal stunned Iran – who had only conceded two goals in their previous five matches – into action as they increased the intensity of their attacks in search of the equaliser.

Iran would have equalised moments later through Abbasi’s strike if it weren’t for Kuromoto’s fine save, with the keeper standing tall against Salar Aghapour’s effort in the 29th minute to maintain Japan’s lead.
With the clock ticking, Iran head coach Vahid Shamsaee employed power play for the first time in Iran’s campaign with Tayebi donning the keeper’s jersey in the 36th minute.

Tayebi came closest in the 39th minute with his strike deflecting off the upright but there was to be more woe for Iran with Abbasi slotting the ball into the back of his own net in the final 30 seconds.

Iran pulled one back through Alireza Javan Shahkali with a second left on the clock but it was meant to be Japan’s final to celebrate.

Oladghobad scoops Most Valuable Player Award

Iran’s Moslem Oladghobad was named the AFC Futsal Asian Cup™ Kuwait 2022 Most Valuable Player on Saturday.

Oladghobad, famed for his precision passing, helped Iran garner wins over Indonesia (6-0), Chinese Taipei (10-1) and Lebanon (9-0) with the 26-year-old scoring twice in the group stage.

The forward found the net once in Iran’s 8-1 quarter-final win over Vietnam before scoring twice in the semi-final against Thailand.

Although Iran were denied a record-extending 13th title by Japan, Oladghobad’s quality was for all to enjoy and admire throughout Kuwait 2022.

AFC congratulates Tayebi on receiving Yili Top Scorer award

Asian Football Confederation (AFC) congratulated Iran’s futsal captain Hossein Tayebi on receiving the Yili Top Scorer award at the 16th edition of the Asian Futsal Cup.

According to Asian Football Confederation (AFC) website on Saturday, the skipper –Tayebi – displayed an amazing performance, scoring 10 goals in six matches as Iran finished runners-up to Japan after a pulsating final.

AFC describes Tayebi’s performance as follows:

The award is a testament to Tayebi’s talent and determination, as he has maintained the fine performance that also saw him picking up the Top Scorer Award in the 2014 and 2018 editions.

The 34-year-old scored six goals in the group stage to help Iran finish top in Group C, before netting a hat-trick against Vietnam in the quarter-finals.

Tayebi then followed it up with a first-minute goal against Thailand in the semi-final that laid the foundation for a 5-0 win.

Accordingly, the AFC’s official Twitter account released a poster of the Iranian captain congratulating him on the award.

Earlier, Iran’s national futsal team, after accepting defeat against Japan in the final of the 16th edition of the Asian Futsal Cup, failed to repeat the championship title in this competition, and the Japanese team won the cup for the 4th time.

The Secretary of Iran’s Nanotechnology Development Headquarters Saeed Sarkar on Sunday announced the production of 1,200 items of nano products in 18 fields of industry.

He made the remarks on the sidelines of the 13th edition of Iran Nano Exhibition on Sunday and stated that the products showcased at the exhibition is to familiarize different sectors of the country with the domestic capabilities and potentials.

It is predicted that trade and economic delegations from 10 countries will take part in this edition of the exhibition with the aim of getting familiar with the salient technological achievements in the field of nano, Sarkar added.

He pointed to the countries interested in participating in this exhibition and added that these business delegations from the countries including Brunei, India, Mexico, Russia and Indonesia which have shown vehement interest to take part in the exhibition.

It is hoped that the trade and business delegations will reach an agreement with the Iranian companies in order to spur country’s exports, he emphasized.

Elsewhere in his remarks, the Secretary pointed to Iran’s rank in the production of science and technology in the region and the world and added that Iran is ranked first among the regional and Islamic countries in the field of nano-science production.

Iran also is ranked 4th in the world after China, India and the United States, he continued.

Currently, over 1,200 nano-based products have been produced in 18 fields of industry which have had a significant impact on updating and empowering industries, he added.

The 13th edition of Iran Nano Exhibition opened in the presence of some Iranian officials including Iranian agriculture minister Javad Sadatinejad in Tehran International Fairground in the north of the capital on Saturday.

Iran’s trade with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member states in the spring saw 29 percent increase, said a senior official in Iran’s Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance.

Majid Karimi, director-general of financial and commercial markets study office at the ministry, told IRNA on Saturday that Iran’s non-oil trade with 11 member states of the SCO reach 9.85 billion dollars in spring.

He said that Iran’s non-oil exports to those countries amounted to 5.5 billion dollars with 20 percent increase compared to the same period last year and its imports accounted to 4.35 billion dollars up by 41 percent.

China, India, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Russia, and Uzbekistan topped Iran’s list of exports destinations among the SCO members this spring, according to Karimi.

He highlighted the presence of China and Russia in the SCO as the two permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and India as an emerging economy adds to the significance of Iran’s accession to the regional organization.

Karimi said that the SCO can remove the dollar and euro from transactions between member states and plan for a single currency in the future, noting that Iran has offered using insurances and financial channels.

The SCO can also adopt proper approaches on sustainable collaborations on energy, as two world’s biggest energy producers (Russia and Iran) and two world’s biggest energy consumers (China and India) are members of the organization.

Iran’s exports to neighboring Turkey show a 49 percent growth in the first eight months of 2022.

According to the Statistical Department of Turkey, Iran exported $2.382 million worth of products to Turkey in the eight months of 2022, showing a 49 percent growth compared to the same period last year.

Accordingly, Turkey’s exchange of products with the Islamic Republic of Iran in the eight months has had a 29 percent growth.

The number was $3.344 this year but had been $4.332 billion in the same period of the current year.

Iranian satellite “Khayyam” launched by Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan Baikonur Cosmodrome in cooperation with Russia. The Khayyam satellite whose ownership is for Iranian Space Agency is proper for making smart different parts of the country.

The home-made Iranian satellite is also aimed at improving agricultural productivity, monitoring water resources and management of natural disasters, among other things.

The Iran develops domestic capabilities and will continue such a cooperation in order to meet its needs and accelerate the process of development in space technology.

Iran’s Minister of Communication and Information Technology Issa Zarepour, who has traveled to Kazakhstan for launch of Khayyam, said through a video message that Iranian Space Agency will continue scientific and technological cooperation with countries which are pioneers in the space industry.

Khayyam satellite was successfully placed in the 500 km orbit of the earth

“Alireza Naimi”, Director General of Space Operation and Space Operations of the Iran Space Organization, announced in an interview: During the process carried out by the satellite carrier, after one hour it was separated from the satellite carrier and placed in a circular orbit 500 km from the earth’s surface. Half an hour later, we received the first telemetry data.

He added: “Receiving the first signals was very happy and satisfying for us, and it can be said that the Khayyam satellite is in a very good condition.”

Naimi said: The satellite is not yet in a condition where we can say that it has entered the practical stage. To achieve this goal, we need about four months to be able to provide the images received from this satellite to the people. (read here)

Khayyam’s sensing satellite has high imaging accuracy and transmits images with a resolution of one meter to the ground.

This satellite is owned and operated by the Islamic Republic of Iran. Guidance and control will be received from ground stations in Iran, and the information and images sent will also be received at these stations.

Omar Khayyam: Persian poet and astronomer

Omar Khayyam, Arabic in full Ghiyāth al-Dīn Abū al-Fatḥ ʿUmar ibn Ibrāhīm al-Nīsābūrī al-Khayyāmī, (born May 18, 1048, Neyshābūr [also spelled Nīshāpūr], Khorāsān [now Iran]—died December 4, 1131, Neyshābūr), Persian mathematician, astronomer, and poet, renowned in his own country and time for his scientific achievements but chiefly known to English-speaking readers through the translation of a collection of his robāʿīyāt (“quatrains”) in The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám (1859), by the English writer Edward FitzGerald.

His name Khayyam (“Tentmaker”) may have been derived from his father’s trade. He received a good education in the sciences and philosophy in his native Neyshābūr before traveling to Samarkand (now in Uzbekistan), where he completed the algebra treatise, Risālah fiʾl-barāhīn ʿalā masāʾil al-jabr waʾl-muqābalah (“Treatise on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra”), on which his mathematical reputation principally rests. In this treatise he gave a systematic discussion of the solution of cubic equations by means of intersecting conic sections. Perhaps it was in the context of this work that he discovered how to extend Abu al-Wafā’s results on the extraction of cube and fourth roots to the extraction of nth roots of numbers for arbitrary whole numbers n.

He made such a name for himself that the Seljuq sultan Malik-Shāh invited him to Eṣfahān to undertake the astronomical observations necessary for the reform of the calendar. (See The Western calendar and calendar reforms.) To accomplish this an observatory was built there, and a new calendar was produced, known as the Jalālī calendar. Based on making 8 of every 33 years leap years, it was more accurate than the present Gregorian calendar, and it was adopted in 1075 by Malik-Shāh. In Eṣfahān he also produced fundamental critiques of Euclid’s theory of parallels as well as his theory of proportion. In connection with the former his ideas eventually made their way to Europe, where they influenced the English mathematician John Wallis (1616–1703); in connection with the latter he argued for the important idea of enlarging the notion of number to include ratios of magnitudes (and hence such irrational numbers as Square root of√2 and π).

His years in Eṣfahān were very productive ones, but after the death of his patron in 1092 the sultan’s widow turned against him, and soon thereafter Omar went on a pilgrimage to Mecca. He then returned to Neyshābūr where he taught and served the court as an astrologer. Philosophy, jurisprudence, history, mathematics, medicine, and astronomy are among the subjects mastered by this brilliant man.

Omar’s fame in the West rests upon the collection of robāʿīyāt, or “quatrains,” attributed to him. (A quatrain is a piece of verse complete in four lines, usually rhyming aaaa or aaba; it is close in style and spirit to the epigram.) Omar’s poems had attracted comparatively little attention until they inspired FitzGerald to write his celebrated The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, containing such now-famous phrases as “A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou,” “Take the Cash, and let the Credit go,” and “The Flower that once has blown forever dies.” These quatrains have been translated into almost every major language and are largely responsible for colouring European ideas about Persian poetry. Some scholars have doubted that Omar wrote poetry. His contemporaries took no notice of his verse, and not until two centuries after his death did a few quatrains appear under his name. Even then, the verses were mostly used as quotations against particular views ostensibly held by Omar, leading some scholars to suspect that they may have been invented and attributed to Omar because of his scholarly reputation.

Each of Omar’s quatrains forms a complete poem in itself. It was FitzGerald who conceived the idea of combining a series of these robāʿīyāt into a continuous elegy that had an intellectual unity and consistency. FitzGerald’s ingenious and felicitous paraphrasing gave his translations a memorable verve and succinctness. They are, however, extremely free translations, and more recently several more faithful renderings of the quatrains have been published.

The verses translated by FitzGerald and others reveal a man of deep thought, troubled by the questions of the nature of reality and the eternal, the impermanence and uncertainty of life, and man’s relationship to God. The writer doubts the existence of divine providence and the afterlife, derides religious certainty, and feels keenly man’s frailty and ignorance. Finding no acceptable answers to his perplexities, he chooses to put his faith instead in a joyful appreciation of the fleeting and sensuous beauties of the material world. The idyllic nature of the modest pleasures he celebrates, however, cannot dispel his honest and straightforward brooding over fundamental metaphysical questions. This article was most recently revised and updated by Amy Tikkanen.

The final stage of the Iran Women’s Softball League, which was held in Tehran, ended with the championship of the “Teif Tehran” team.

“Rif Isfahan” team was second and “Organa Hormozgan” team was third.

Video: Iran women’s softball league final match 2022

Softball was started in Iran in 1997 with the help of Japanese living in Tehran, and today more than 250 female athletes are active in softball in more than 10 provinces.