Fars News Agency is a news agency in Iran. While it describes itself as "Iran's leading independent news agency", news organizations such as CNN

CNN

Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...

 and Reuters

Reuters

Reuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...

 describe it as a "semi-official" news agency with ties to the government. The Wall Street Journal has stated the agency is affiliated with the Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Its managing director Saeid Noubari is a former head of the public relations office of the Tehran Justice Department. FNA's managing editor Mehdi Fazaeli is also the spokesman of Iran's Association of Muslim Journalists.

In addition to Persian

Persian language

Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is primarily spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and countries which historically came under Persian influence...

, FNA also provides news in English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

, Turkish

Turkish language

Turkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,...

 and Arabic

Arabic language

Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...

.

Unlike the majority of Western news outlets, and even Al Jazeera, Fars does not appear to have any advertising on its site.