To any western viewer it would have been the most normal thing in the world: a TV programme showing a group of musicians performing and playing live in the studio. But viewers inIranfound themselves rubbing their eyes in disbelief when the morning programme broadcast the musicians playing traditional Persian instruments, because for many it was the ...

The inclusion of the art of playing on the tar in the UNESCO Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity as part of the Azerbaijani culture has caused a serious outrage in Iran. "This is a gross distortion of the history of music in the region, said head of Iran's House of Music Dariush Pirniakan (Tehran Times). "This instrument ...