Iran’s new Space station

Iran has also unveiled domestic satellites Tehran – Arabstoday Iran’s first space monitoring facility will be inaugurated in the coming weeks, Defence Minister Ahmad Vahidi has announced. The ceremony will take place during the 10-Day Dawn celebrations, between January 31 and February 10, to commemorate Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution. The news comes after Iran announced it would reattempt to launch primates into space using its Pioneer [Pishgam] space capsule during the festivities. Iran’s space agency director, Hamid Fazeli, announced on January 15 that the space capsule had undergone final tests and was ready to be launched. Iran has already sent small animals into space -- a rat, turtles and worms -- but its previous attempt to send a live monkey into space failed in 2011, which was announced without explanation. Fazeli said the monkey project would help Iran "implement the preparations of sending a man into space," which officials say is scheduled for 2020. As part of its bolstered space programme, Iran also plans to put the domestically manufactured Sharifsat satellite into orbit by the end of the current Iranian calendar year, which ends on March 20. A new domestic satellite, named the Nahid, is also scheduled to be unveiled on February 2, otherwise known as National Space Technology Day.