Iran Launches Monkey into Space

Tehran, Iran---Iran's of­fi­cial news agen­cy, IRNA, re­port­ed to­day that the Is­lam­ic re­pub­lic has re­cov­ered alive a rhe­sus macaque which it had sent in­to Earth's low­er iono­sphere Mon­day.

The docile, 17 in. tall, 14 lb. main­ly her­biv­o­rous Ma­ca­cus rhe­sus vil­lo­sus be­comes the high­est-or­der mam­mal yet to have sur­vived hav­ing been launched in­to space by the char­ter Ax­is of Evil na­tion. Dur­ing its twen­ty minute voy­age aboard the rock­et-pro­pelled cap­sule Pishgam, the crea­ture re­port­ed­ly achieved an al­ti­tude of 75 miles, briefly lo­cat­ing it just with­in the low­est reach­es of an ex­treme­ly loose def­i­ni­tion of space.