Fars News Agency

Fars News Agency (Persian: خبرگزاری فارس) began publishing in 2003 under founding director Mohammad Jahanbani, and it has since grown into one of the most widely cited Iranian outlets in foreign coverage of the country. The agency describes itself as Iran's leading independent news agency, a claim Western governments and press monitors dispute. Its output runs in four languages, Persian, English, Arabic and Turkish, across a website, a print edition and social accounts on X, Instagram and Facebook. The English service is the one most often quoted by international wire desks, particularly when it carries statements from the Revolutionary Guards, the army or the foreign ministry.

The agency sits inside the media apparatus of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which funds and oversees it through affiliated foundations. That relationship shapes what Fars covers and how. It breaks military and security news before the state broadcaster does, and its reports are regularly picked up by Reuters, Al Arabiya, Middle East Eye and The Jerusalem Post, usually with attribution rather than endorsement. Its domestic audience is large; its foreign audience is mostly analysts, diplomats and journalists who read it to track official messaging rather than to confirm facts.

Sanctions have narrowed its reach outside Iran. The US Treasury designated the agency in January 2020 under Executive Order 13902, which blocked its .com domain and pushed it to farsnews.ir. A second designation in September 2023 placed it on the OFAC list of Specially Designated Nationals, barring US persons from doing business with it. Fars still publishes continuously, and its reporting on the Strait of Hormuz, missile programs and regional militias remains a primary window into IRGC positions. [modifier]