Tehran mayor has been chosen as the eighth best mayor of the world out of 800 top mayors of 2008.

The website www.worldmayor.com dedicated to choosing the best mayors of the world has chosen top mayors after long studies and on the basis of opinion polls carried out among citizens of big cities. Tehran Mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf was among the top 10 mayors.

The site first selected 800 top mayors before short-listing 50 of them and calling on citizens to choose top 11 mayors of the world through online voting from January to June this year.

In that voting, 50 mayors were first chosen and 11 mayors with the highest number of votes were finally introduced with Ghalibaf ranking 8th among them.

Helen Zille, the mayor of Cape Town in South Africa was chosen the best mayor of the world.

World Mayor, a project organized by the urban affairs think tank City Mayors, aims to raise the profile of mayors worldwide as well as to honor those who have made long-lasting contributions to their communities and are committed to the well-being of cities nationally and internationally. According to city residents from all continents, a great mayor must possess these qualities: leadership and vision, good management abilities, social and economic awareness, ability to provide security and to protect the environment as well as having the skill to foster good relations between communities from different cultural, racial and social backgrounds. The World Mayor Project was first carried out in 2004.