Concurrent with Norouz holidays, marking the beginning of the New Iranian Year, Iran and Malaysia will hold a joint kite festival in Mahmoudabad city of Mazandaran province.
The festival slated for March 23-April 2 will be organized with the cooperation of the city’s municipality.
The Public Relations Office of Iran-Malaysia Friendship Group quoted head of the group as saying that the main motive behind the event was to attract tourists and convey a message of friendship to children and other segments of the society.
Also numerous programs including a book fair, children’s paining competition, cultural promotion program, live traditional music performances and mythical theaters such as Rostam and Sohrab as well as Bijan and Manijeh are planned for the sidelines of the festival, Rajabali Khosrowabadi noted.
He concluded that the event would wrap up in a ceremony with domestic and foreign guests in attendance on April 2.

Unfettered use of unsafe firecrackers and explosives to celebrate Chahrshanbeh Souri claimed four lives and injured 810 individuals across the country, head of the Medical Emergency Organization said.
Farzad Panahi added that Tehran province ranked first in terms of the number of incidents on the night with 464 injuries, CHN reported.
He put the number of people who lost their lives in accidents associated with the Feast of Wednesday at one in Tehran, one in West Azarbaijan, one in Kermanshah and one in Hormuzgan province.
The injuries were registered at 77 in Hamedan province, 67 in Fars province, 30 in the city of Arak, 30 in Ardebil province, 24 in Babol city, 25 in Bushehr province, 27 in Qazvin province, 25 in Khorasan Razavi province as 19 in Qom province.
Meanwhile, deputy head of Tehran Medical Emergency Department for education and research affairs said that 33 individuals were injured on Chahrshanbeh Souri night in Tehran, of whom 15 suffered burns and 15 eye injuries.
According to Moazzami, four of the injured were above 25 years, one was less than 15 and 10 were between 15-25 years old.
In the run-up to the last Wednesday of the year, marking a national feast associated with bonfires, children and adolescents tend to use dangerous firecrackers and explosives to celebrate the occasion.

Over 3.5 million hectares of land are still infested with undetected mines mostly planted in border areas during the 1980-88 Iraq-imposed war.
Chairwomen of the board of directors of the Mine Clearing Collaboration Campaign, Shirin Ebadi, was quoted by IRNA as saying that mine explosions kill or maim an average three persons a day in Iran’s western borders.
Speaking at a conference on landmines sponsored by the campaign, Ebadi urged the public, officials and international organizations to help accelerate clearance of minefields.
Commending the extensive efforts exerted to remove landmines in recent years, the Nobel peace laureate insisted that information about landmines should be properly disseminated so as to prevent further losses.
Ebadi observed, “The predicaments facing landmine victims should be read out loud. The world should be informed of how many mines are still planted in Iran which needed to be cleared. The people should all join hands since this is about saving the lives of thousands individuals.“
World figures suggest that between 70 and 110 million anti-personnel mines are still laid in 50 countries. An annual 20,000 civilians and military forces are either lose their lives or are maimed by landmine explosions. Children, women and the elderly are among the first victims of the deadly detonation.
Many Iranian border areas were planted with mines by Iraqi forces during the eight-year war. Maps of the most mine-littered areas are not available to help expedite their clearance.
The mine-infested areas even lack warning signs to alert the people of the lurking danger.
The many victims of unexploded ordnance need special medical care and assistance.
Shirin Ebadi, the 2003 Nobel Peace laureate, launched her “Mine Clearing Collaboration Campaign“ at the Nairobi Summit on a Mine-Free World in Kenya in December 2004.

Public education can help scale down quake losses in cities by as high as 70 percent.

Head of Tehran Crisis Management Organization gave news that over one million books and CDs about earthquake contingency planning were being distributed in Tehran’s municipal districts one to seven free of charge by the Postal Company, IRNA reported.
Mazyar Hosseini noted that the project had started two weeks ago and would run until March 20, marking the end of the current Persian year.
He emphasized the importance of public awareness about methods of minimizing the financial and human losses associated with tremblers.
“The municipality has been distributing the books with the purpose of boosting public knowledge and preparedness. Norouz holidays will be a good time for citizens to study the books and CDs carefully,“ he added.
“The contents of the book are the result of expertise and know-how gained by studying major and minor earthquakes across the world.“
Hosseini asserted that public education can help scale down quake losses in cities by as high as 70 percent.
“Given the existence of old and ramshackle buildings in a vast area of a metropolis like Tehran, the significance of public education seems to be undeniable.“
He said a large number of Tehrani dwellers are in the dark about ways and means of reducing quake damages.
“Buildings which are not quake-resistant as well as heavy tableaus and chandeliers on walls and ceilings can intensify damages of a seismic tremor,“ he warned.

Thirty-five million people nationwide suffer from vitamin A deficiency, a disorder which can disrupt the immune system and cause increased vulnerability to diseases.
Seyyed Morteza Safavi, director general of the ministry’s Office for Improving Nutrition, told IRNA that the deficiency is a major health and nutrition problem that can lead to impaired dark adaptation (also called night blindness).
He added that vitamin A deficiency impairs the body’s defenses against infections by breakdown of resistant barriers at epithelial and mucosal surfaces.
Safavi said 5.2 percent of the population over two years of age suffer from night vision induced by lack of vitamin A.
“Severe deficiency of vitamin A can impair the vision, while at milder levels it increases the risk of infectious diseases and even death,“ he warned, recommending people to include dairy products such as cheese, milk and butter, yolk, fresh vegetables and fruits in their dietary program.
Studies show children suffering from vitamin A deficiency are at greater risk of death from measles and more prone to respiratory infections and diarrhea.
Approximately 90 percent of the vitamin A is stored in liver, he said, adding such storage incrementally increases to reach its maximum level in adulthood. Therefore, when the liver storage is reduced, deficiency of vitamin A emerges.
Safavi said the main reasons behind the deficiency are either the insufficient intake of food rich in vitamin A, or the abnormal metabolism.
Some foods rich in vitamin A liver, sweet potatoes, carrots, mangoes, spinach, cantaloupe, dried apricots, milk, egg yolks and cheese.
Elaborating on ways to prevent vitamin A deficiency, the official mentioned breastfeeding babies under two years, washing hands and disinfecting vegetables as effective measures.
According to the World Health Organization, 2.8-3 million under-five children suffer from vitamin A deficiency, while an annual 500,000 children of the same age are exposed to blindness.

The number of people diagnosed with tuberculosis is registered at slightly less than 10,000, 40 of whom are reportedly suffering from drug-resistant TB, head of Health Ministry’s Tuberculosis and Leprosy Department unveiled.
As reported by ISNA, Mahshid Nasehi stated that close to 4,800 Iranians and about 1,630 non-Iranians are wrestling with the respiratory tuberculosis countrywide.
Citing the above statistics, the official estimated that 15 per 100,000 population are infected with TB bacillus.
Speaking in the run-up to the World Tuberculosis Day (March 24), she said that male patients account for 52 percent of TB cases. “Also the majority of patients are above 65 years of age, testifying that TB control plans have been successful,“ he added.
Nasehi noted that 85 percent of TB cases are reported in 22 countries, among which the neighboring Afghanistan and Pakistan are seen.
She further pointed out that anti-TB programs formerly implemented in Iraq were disrupted in the wake of the American invasion, not to mention the high TB rate in Azerbaijan and Armenia, located to the north of Iran.
According to the official, free TB testing and medications are provided in the country for everyone irrespective of their nationalities.
Highlighting that TB is an infectious disease capable of spreading to all organs, Nasehi elaborated that it usually affects lungs (80 to 85 percent). More attention should be paid to respiratory TB since it is a highly-contagious air-borne bacterial health problem.
Those suffering from malnutrition, HIV-virus, diabetes, cancer and occupational health problems such as silicosis are more at risk of developing the infectious disease, she concluded.
Meanwhile, head of the Disease Management Center’s laboratory affairs stated that specialized TB laboratories had been launched in all cities.
According to ILNA, Afshin Safaiei said that training courses and workshops would be held for laboratory experts to keep them abreast of latest medical progress in this regard.
He called on the public to refer to state laboratories for free TB tests. “The laboratories are strictly controlled by the Health Ministry. They observe standards and enjoy the services of expert personnel,“ the official expanded.

Unsighted people will be able to use ordinary personal computers if they are equipped with Jaws screen reading software, according to ILNA.
Head of the Center for Empowering the Blind affiliated to Isfahan Welfare Department said the software features a speech synthesizer to read screen text.
“The data entered via the keyboard is transformed into audio files by the software,“ Ziaee elaborated.
According to the official, each PC with special keyboards customized for the blind people costs about 140 million rials.
“Jaws has drastically slashed the costs,“ he said. “The good news is that the software positively affects the employment of blind people. Using the screen reader, they can work as operators in different enterprises.“
Jaws software is presently only being used in Isfahan, he said, insisting that it has to be employed all across the country.

People buy Sabzeh (grown wheat or lentil sprouts) and willow twigs to celebrate Norouz (the start of New Iranian Year). (Photo by Mousa Kourehie)

Some 30 million Russians are living outside their homeland as one of the biggest national diasporas in the world, a Russian Foreign Ministry official dealing with ŽmigrŽ issues said.
“Consulates have around 1.2 million citizens on their lists,“ but that figure was only around a fifth of the real number of emigrants and did not include up to 24 million former citizens with Russian roots, Alexander Chepurin was quoted as saying in an interview with RIA-Novosti news agency.
The current population of Russia is around 143 million people, according to official estimates.
Much of the diaspora is composed of Russians who ended up outside the country’s borders when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, said Chepurin, who heads up a foreign ministry department charged with making policies on Russians living abroad.
Chepurin estimated that Russians made up more than 20 percent of the population in the former Soviet states of Estonia, Kazakhstan, Latvia and Ukraine.
The official urged “some countries of the former Soviet Union“ to protect Russian culture, language and education.
“Pressure or forceful erasing of the language and culture of a national minority, the violation of its rights and freedoms is a direct way of destabilizing the situation,“ he said.