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IRAN

Capital
Tehran

Area
1,684,184 square km (1 km = 0.62 miles), bordered by Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan to the north, Turkey and Iraq to the west and Afghanistan and Pakistan to the east. Its southern coast extends from the head of the Persian Gulf to the Indian Ocean.

Language
Persian is the official language, and Kurdish is a minority language.

POLITICAL PROFILE | HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDICATORS | ECONOMIC INDICATORS | MILITARY STATISTICS | COMMUNICATIONS

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DETAILS

Population
65.5 million (2003), 105.5 million (2050)

Ethnic group
Persian 51 percent, Azeri 24 percent, Kurds 9 percent, Gilaki/Mazandarani 8 percent, Lurs, Arabs, Balochs, Bakhtars, Turkmens, Armenians.

Religion
The Shi'ite sect of Islam predominates (93.4 percent), with some Sunni Muslims (5.7 percent). Other religious minorities include Baha'is, Orthodox Christians of Armenian descent, Jews and Zoroastrians.

Climate
Hot summers, bitterly cold winters; rainfall sparse over most of the country.

Currency
Rial

Time zone
GMT +3 1/2

Public holidays
2004: Jan 7*, Feb 2*, 8*, 11, March 1*, 2*, 20-24, 31*, April 1, 2, 10*, 18*, May 2*, 7*, June 4, Aug 29*, Sep 12*, Nov 5*, 14* Dec 12*
(*These holidays are dependent on the Islamic lunar calendar and may vary by one or two days from the dates given)

Electricity
220V AC 50Hz

Travel rules
Passport, visa and transit visa required by all. Persons continuing their journey within 24 hours and holding confirmed tickets and documents for their onward journey do not require transit visas. Entry and transit visa is refused to nationals of Israel, and women if not conforming to Islamic standards of modesty in dress.

Driving
Driving is on the right, International Driving Permit required.

Health rules
Yellow fever certificate required if arriving within six days from or via infected areas. Hepatitis A, malaria, polio, tetanus and typhoid immunisation recommended. Diphtheria and hepatitis B immunisation recommended in some circumstances. Chloroquine-resistant malaria exists from March to November, mainly in the provinces of Sistan-Baluchistan, Hormozgan and Kerman, and in parts of the provinces of Bakhtaran, Bushehr, Chahar Mahal, Fars, Ilam, Khuzestan, Kokhliuyeh and Lorestan. Risk of rabies. Milk should be boiled, and food well cooked. Avoid bathing in fresh water.

Source: Europa World Year Book 2003
POLITICAL PROFILE
The autocratic, U.S.-backed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavai was overthrown in the 1979 revolution. He went into exile, ending a monarchy which, with some gaps, lasted 2,500 years.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini emerged as spiritual leader of the revolution, returning to Tehran in February 1979 after 15 years of exile in Iraq and several months in Paris.

An Islamic Republic was proclaimed after a referendum in April 1979. The constitution adopted in December of that year entrusted supreme power to Khomeini as the top religious authority.

Fundamentalist students, demanding that Washington hand over the Shah to Iran for trial, seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran on November 4, 1979, and held its staff for 444 days.

The Shah died of cancer in Egypt in August 1980, four months after a secret U.S. military mission to rescue the hostages failed in a sandstorm in a central Iranian desert.

In September 1980, border skirmishes erupted into a full-scale Iraqi invasion. Baghdad proclaimed sovereignty over the Shatt al-Arab waterway and seized Iran's biggest commercial port, Khoramshahr, and other towns and villages.

Iran said the war was instigated by Western powers to stifle its revolution. Iran recaptured Khorramshahr in 1982, but Khomeini took the war into Iraq and the conflict continued until August 1988, when a U.N.-brokered ceasefire took effect.

Western military experts said up to one million people were killed in the conflict, in which both sides also attacked oil tankers and cargo ships in the Gulf and U.N. experts confirmed Iraq's use of poisonous gas.

In November 1986, it was revealed that the United States had been secretly in contract with Iran for 18 months, selling weapons in exchange for Tehran's help in freeing American hostages held by pro-Iranian militants in Lebanon.

In February 1989, Khomeini ordered Moslems to kill British author, Salman Rushdie for blaspheming Islam in his book "The Satanic Verses". This led to a row with the West and reversed a year-long trend towards moderation in foreign policy.

Khomeini died in June 1989, after surgery to remove a cancerous third of his stomach. He was buried after a tumultuous funeral and his grave, south of Tehran, became a shrine.

President Ali Khamenei was promptly chosen as Khomeini's spiritual successor by an assembly of senior clerics. He teamed up with parliamentary speaker Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjai, who was elected president by a landslide in a July 1989 election.

Both Rafsanjani and Khamenei stressed that rebuilding the economy and improving living standards were high priority goals.

Hardliners criticised the government's moderate foreign policy and aspects of its market reforms, but were sidelined after losing most of their seats in parliament in 1992 elections.

When Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990, Iran took a neutral stance, denouncing both Baghdad's conquest of Kuwait and any long-term presence of U.S. forces in the region.

Iran's neutrality in the conflict over Kuwait and the six-week Gulf War in 1991 won favour among Western Arab countries.

Tehran reaped the benefit, resuming diplomatic links with Britain and Saudi Arabia, among others.

However, strains with the United States worsened under U.S. President Bill Clinton, who imposed oil and trade sanctions against Tehran in June 1995, accusing it of supporting terrorism and seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. Iran denied the charges.

In May 1997, Mohammad Khatami, former minister for culture and Islamic guidance, won a landslide victory in the presidential election, succeeding Rafsanjani.

In June 1997, Iran joined Turkey, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Egypt, Malaysia, Pakistan and Nigeria in founding the Developing Eight (D8) economic cooperation group, based in Turkey. Iran is also a member of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC), based in Saudi Arabia, and the Economic Cooperation Organisation (ECO), based in Tehran.

Khatami's victory in the 1997 election sparked a power struggle between his reformist followers and hardliners loyal to Khamenei. In the general election of February 2000, the reformists won an overwhelming victory, taking 226 of the 290 parliamentary seats.

In the next presidential election in June 2001, Khatami was re-elected with 77 percent of the vote, compared with less than 16 percent for the leading conservative candidate.

Iran condemned suicide attacks on New York and Washington on September 11, 2001, but opposed retaliatory strikes on Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. It called instead for a U.N.-led coalition to fight world terrorism instead.

Protests took place around Iran after the United States and Britain initiated a bombing campaign against Afghanistan, but most were peaceful. U.S. President branded Iran part of an "axis of evil" alongside North Korea and Iraq.

While critical of the Taliban, Khatami had to take into account hardliners in his country who demanded a tougher stance against the West.

An earthquake measuring 6.3 on the Richter scale rocked northwestern Iran on June 22, 2002. It killed more than 200 people and left about 25,000 homeless in the Qazvin/Hamadan area.

In July 2003, the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog pressed Iran to open its nuclear power programme and prove it was not violating international agreements.

Iran's repeated failures to declare nuclear activities, facilities and materials spurred suspicion that it was developing a clandestine nuclear weapons programme. Iran denied the accusation.

An earthquake hit southern Iran, particularly the historic town of Bam, on December 26, 2003. At least 30,000 people were killed, and about 100,000 left homeless.



Source: Reuters
HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDICATORS
Infant mortality
35 per 1,000 live births (2001)

Maternal mortality
37 per 100,000 live births (1985-2001)

Life expectancy
68.5 years men, 71.3 years women (2001)

Illiteracy
16.2 percent male, 29.8 percent female above 15 years (2001)

Access to basic care
80-94 percent (2001) (sustainable access to affordable essential drugs)

Access to safe water
92 percent

Human development index value
0.719 (2001)

Source: UNDP Human Development Report 2003
ECONOMIC INDICATORS
GDP
$111 billion (2002)

Per capita
$1,533 (2002)

Growth
5.8 percent (2002)

Inflation
16.0 percent (2002)

Debt
$7.2 billion (2002)

Defence budget
$4.2 billion (2003)

Source: Military Balance 2003/2004, IISS
MILITARY STATISTICS
Armed forces
540,000 active (estimated); 350,000 reserves. Paramilitary: 40,000 active; Revolutionary Guard Corps: 120,000 (estimated)

Army
350,000 (perhaps 220,000 conscripts); 1,565 tanks and 50 attack helicopters

Navy
18,000 with three submarines, three frigates, 56 patrol and coastal combat vessels

Air force
Estimated 52,000 with 306 combat aircraft (perhaps about 60 percent of U.S. types serviceable), no armed helicopters

Opposition rebels
Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran, estimated 1,200-1,800

Source: Military Balance 2003/2004, IISS
COMMUNICATIONS
Civil aviation
There are international airports in Tehran (Mehrabad), Abadan, and Esfahan. The Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran is 53 km west of the city. Work on a new international airport, 40 km south of Tehran, abandoned in 1979, resumed in the mid-1980s, and work on three others, at Tabas, Ardebil and Ilam was later under way. The airports at Urumiyeh, Ahwaz, Bakhtaran, Sanandaj, Abadan Hamadan and Shiraz are to be modernised and smaller ones constructed at Lar, Lamard, Rafsanjan, Bam, Kashan, Maragheh, Khoy, Sirjan and Abadeh. The Kish Island airport can take Boeing 747 and Airbus jets. Construction of the Imam Khomeini International Airport in Tehran, anticipated to be one of the largest airports in the world, began in the late 1990s. The first phase of the project was completed in early 2001, and the airport was expected to be fully operational by 2003.

Iran Air serves several destinations in the Middle East and Gulf area, Europe, Asia and the Far East.

Iran Asseman Airlines has domestic routes and charter services.

Kish Air serves the Gulf area, Tehran, Dubai, Frankfurt, London and Paris.

Saha Airline operates weekly cargo service between Tehran and Singapore, and a weekly service from Masstricht Aachen Airport to Sharjah Airport in the United Arab Emirates.

In early 1995, the Economic Cooperation Organisation, which groups Iran, Turkey, Pakistan, Azerbaijan and the five former Soviet Central Asian Republics, agreed to establish a regional airline, Eco Air, based in Tehran.

Payam Airlines operates weekly Tehran-Frankfurt cargo flight and plans to have five flights a week to Europe.

Railways
In 1999, the Iranian railway system, generally single-tracked, had a 6,300 km network with 146 km of electrified lines.

The Trans-Iranian Railway runs from Bandar Turkman on the Caspian Sea in the north, through Tehran, and south to Bandar Imam Khomeini on the Gulf.

The Southern Line links Tehran to Khorramshahr via Qom, Arak, Dorood, Andimeshk and Ahwaz.

The Northern Line connects Tehran to Gorgan via Garmsar, Firooz Khooh and Sari.

There are also the Tehran-Kerman Line, Tehran-Tabriz Line, Tabriz-Djulfa Electric Line, Garmsar-Meshed Line, Qom-Zahedan Line, Zahedan-Quetta (Pakistan) Line, Ahwaz-Bandar Khomeini Liner, Azerbaijan Railway and the Bandar-Abbas-Bafq Line.

In June 1996, Iran opened a rail link between landlocked Turkmenistan and Mashhad. In 1997, Iran relaunched train services to Azerbaijan's enclave of Nakhichevan after a disruption of nine years. The weekly service had been halted in 1988 due to the conflict in the region between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. The trains carry passengers and cargo.
Tehran Metro: Chinese contractors began work in 1977 on two lines, one 34 km in length running north to south, and the second, 20 km, running east to west. The project's first phase was expected to become operational in February 1997. An electric railway line in Tehran's suburbs has been agreed.

Roads
In 1998, there were 167,157 km of roads, including 890 km of motorways, 24,940 km of main roads, and 68,238 km of secondary or regional roads. About 56 percent of the road network was paved. There is a paved highway (A1, 2,089 km), from Bazargan, on the Turkish border, to the Afghanistan border. The A2 highway runs from the Iraqi border to Mir Javeh, on the Pakistan border.

Telecomms
149 main telephone lines per 1,000 people (2000)

Source: Europa World Year Book 2003; NI World Guide 2003/2004
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  • AlertNet Iran earthquake emergency page

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    Last updated:Wed Feb 10 14:10:32 2010