Tehran, July 26 (DPA) An Iranian plane had to make an emergency landing here Sunday right after taking off, IRNA reported.

The Tupelev airplane, owned by Iranian airline Mahan, was on its way from Tehran to the Persian Gulf port of Mahshahr when it was forced to return to the capital's Mehrabad airport.

A spokesman of the civil aviation organisation told IRNA that both plane and passengers were safe.

He declined to give any further details on the incident pending technical inspections.

This incident was the third of its kind within the last three weeks.

The first was a fatal crash of a Caspian Airlines plane July 15 in Qazvin, which killed all 168 people on board.

The second was last Friday when a Kazakh plane rented by Iran's Aria airways caught fire while landing in Mashad in northeastern Iran.

Sixteen people, including 12 Kazakh crew members and the Russian pilot, were killed in the incident.

There were also reports of another emergency landing Saturday in Oroumieh, in northwestern Iran, but the reports could not be confirmed.