CA-NEWS (TJ) - OSCE Secretary General Marc Perrin de Brichambaut yesterday signed a resolution recognizing Nowruz (In Tajik NAvrouz) as the OSCE international SCE holiday, according to the Tajik MFA information department.

The decision on recognition Nowruz s the OSCE international holiday was made following request by representative missions of Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and a number of other countries to OSCE, the source said.

We will recall that the United Nations General Assembly recognized the International Day of Nowruz (In Tajik Navrouz), a spring festival of Persian origin, on February 23 this year.

According to the preamble of the resolution on the International Day (document A/64/L.30/Rev.2), Nowruz, which means new day, is celebrated on 21 March, the day of the vernal equinox, by more than 300 million people worldwide as the beginning of the new year. It has been celebrated for over 3,000 years in the Balkans, the Black Sea Basin, the Caucasus, Central Asia, the Middle East and other regions. The Assembly called on Member States that celebrate the festival to study its history and traditions with a view to disseminating that knowledge among the international community and organizing annual commemoration events. Welcoming the inclusion of Nowruz into the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on 30 September 2009, the text notes the festival's "affirmation of life in harmony with nature, the awareness of the inseparable link between constructive labor and natural cycles of renewal and the solicitous and respectful attitude towards natural sources of life".

Navrouz, which literary means New Day in Persian, Dari and Tajik languages, is the traditional Iranian new year holiday celebrated by Iranian and many other peoples. It marks the first day of spring and is celebrated on the day of the astronomical vernal equinox (the start of spring in the northern hemisphere), which usually occurs on March 21 or the previous/following day depending on where it is observed.

Today, the festival of Navrouz is celebrated in many countries, including Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, as well as Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan. Many peoples in West and South Asia, Northeast China, the Crimea, as well as Albania, Bosnia, Kosovo and Macedonia also celebrate this holiday.