Iran

State · Capital: Tehran

Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran and historically known as Persia, is a country in West Asia with a population of over 92 million; its capital and largest city is Tehran. The territory was first unified under the Medes in the 7th century BC, and Cyrus the Great founded the Achaemenid Empire in the 6th century BC, followed by the Parthian and Sasanian empires. In the 16th century the Safavid dynasty re-established a unified Iranian state with Twelver Shia Islam as the official religion, laying the framework for the modern state of Iran. The Pahlavi dynasty was established by Reza Shah in 1925, and his son Mohammad Reza Pahlavi rose to power after the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran in 1941.