Fargam

Fargam (Auspicious in Persian) was the name of a male Rhesus macaque monkey launched into space by Iran. This was Iran's second successful and third overall attempt at launching a monkey into space, their first attempt in 2011 had failed as the animal died in space. The news was released by Iranian state TV which also showed footage of Fargam strapped inside the rocket. Former president Rouhani congratulated Iranian Scientists afterwards, touting it as a "long step in getting the Islamic Republic of Iran closer to sending a man into space".

Technology
Fargam was launched inside a Pishgam capsule aboard a Kavoshgar booster, more commonly known as a Kavoshgar-Pishgam rocket, both of which where developed and produced domestically by Iranian scientists and engineers. The rocket was reported to have reached an altitude of 120 km (75 miles) before the capsule was parachuted down. The whole mission was reported to have lasted 15 minutes.

Skepticism
Due to Iran's secretive nature about their space program, they only announced the launch happened after it had successfully completed its mission. This, combined with a lack of immediate visual confirmation, resulted in skeptics claiming that Fargam had died sometime during the mission. When Iran finally released footage of the launch, observers noted that the monkey in the capsule was totally different to Fargam, with darker hair and a prominent red mole over its left eye. The monkey displayed in the video of the launch was actually the monkey that perished in the earlier 2011 mission. Mohammad Ebrahimi, a spokesmen for the Iranian Space Agency, claimed that the team in charge of assembling promotional material accidentally used one of Fargam's backups for all the promotional material. Iran has, to this day, denied the 2011 launch, and the death of its rhesus monkey pilot, ever took place. Jonathan McDowell, a Canadian astronomer at Harvard who tracks rocket launches, confirmed that the monkey seen in the promotional material was the ill-fated 2011 monkey, and that there is no reason to believe Fargam's flight was unsuccessful.