Google – AFP, 14 December 2013
Tehran —
Iran said on Saturday that it had safely returned a monkey to Earth after
blasting it into space in the second such launch this year in its controversial
ballistic programme.
President
Hassan Rouhani congratulated the scientists involved in the mission, in a
message carried by the official IRNA news agency.
The report
added that the rocket reached a height of 120 kilometres (75 miles).
In January,
Iran said it had successfully brought a live monkey, which it named Pishgam
(Pioneer), back to Earth from orbit.
But the
experiment's success was disputed, when a different monkey was presented to the
media after the landing.
An earlier
attempt had failed in September 2011.
Iran's
space programme has prompted concern among Western governments, which fear Tehran
is trying to master the technology required to deliver a nuclear warhead.
The Islamic
republic insists that its nuclear programme is entirely peaceful.
"By
the grace of God and through the efforts of Iranian space scientists, the
Pajohesh (research) rocket containing the second live space monkey, named
Fargam (Auspicious), was sent into space and brought back to Earth
safely," Rouhani said in his message.
State
television broadcast footage of the rocket launch which state television said
took place on Saturday morning.
A
helicopter brought a capsule to the scene which the reporter said contained the
monkey, and later footage of a monkey wearing a red shirt was shown.
Iran's
space programme was heavily promoted by Rouhani's controversial predecessor Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad, who quipped in February that he was "ready to be the first
Iranian to be sacrificed by the scientists of my country and go into space,
even though I know there are a lot of candidates".
To the
dismay of animal welfare groups, Fargam was following in the footsteps of a
menagerie of dogs and monkeys that were among the early stars of the US and
Soviet space programmes in the 1960s.
Earlier
this year, Iranian space officials raised the prospect of sending a Persian cat
into space.
"Iran's
archaic experiment... is a throwback to the primitive techniques of the
1950s," People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals spokesman Ben
Williamson said at the time.
The stated
aim of Iran's programme is a manned launch by 2020.
The
programme deeply unsettles Western governments as the technology used in space
rockets can also be used in ballistic missiles.
The UN
Security Council has imposed an almost total embargo on the export of nuclear
and space technology to Iran since 2007.
Tehran
denies its space programme has any link with its alleged nuclear ambitions.
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