TEHERAN (AFP) - Iran on Monday sent a capsule containing a live monkey into space and later retrieved the "shipment" intact, the Tehran-based Arab-language Al-Alam channel said, quoting an official statement.

Previous attempts by the Islamic republic to put a monkey into space have failed.

"Iran sucessufully launched a capsule, codenamed Pishgam (Pioneer), containing a monkey and recovered the shipment on the ground intact," said the statement by the defence ministry's aerospace department. It did not mention the condition of the monkey.