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The Keur Farah Pahlavi Project and Iranian-Senegalese Relations in the 1970s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Robert Steele*
Affiliation:
Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures, University of California, Los Angeles

Abstract

Addressing the scarcity of scholarly literature on Iran’s involvement in Sub-Saharan Africa during the Pahlavi period, this paper demonstrates that throughout the 1970s, as the shah’s international standing rose and Iran’s economy grew, so too did Iran’s political and economic relationships with several African countries, especially Senegal. The article will explore a number of factors that stimulated this relationship, most significantly Senegal’s strategic and symbolic importance, and the personal friendships that developed between the countries’ leaders. The ultimate manifestation of this bilateral relationship was the Keur Farah Pahlavi project; a joint Iranian–Senegalese city to be constructed in Senegal. By exploring this project, the paper aims to demonstrate the strategies through which the Pahlavi state sought to expand its influence worldwide.

Type
Iran in the World
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2021

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Footnotes

The author would like to thank the Iranian Studies anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on the paper, and the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA for supporting this research through the Jahangir and Eleanor Amuzegar Fellowship.

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