ISNA

Iranian protesters stormed the Saudi Embassy in Tehran early on Jan. 3 as Shiite Muslim Iran reacted with fury to Saudi Arabia's execution of a prominent Shiite cleric. 

Iran said on Nov. 2 it would pull out of Syria peace talks if it found them unconstructive, citing Saudi Arabia's negative role, according to the ISNA news agency. 

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and his deputies will attend Syria peace talks in Vienna on Oct. 30, the semi- official ISNA news agency reported. 

"Deputy Foreign Ministers Hossein Amir Abdollahian, Abbas Araqchi and Majid Takht Ravanchi will accompany Zarif on this trip," foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham was quoted as saying by ISNA. 

A court in Iran has convicted Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, Iran's ISNA news agency said on Oct. 11, but the U.S. newspaper said Tehran was working a political angle by not disclosing details. 

Iran has threatened to boycott next week's Frankfurt Book Fair because organisers have invited the author Salman Rushdie, who still has a fatwa against him, as a guest speaker.
 

In a sign of thawing relations of the West with Iran Britain has reopened its embassy in Tehran on Sunday, newswires reported.

"Today's ceremony marks the end of one phase in the relationship between our two countries and the start of a new one - one that I believe offers the promise of better," British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said, according to Reuters.

The mother of Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian, on trial in Iran for espionage, told reporters outside a Tehran court on July 13 that she hopes he will be freed on bail.

Iran and major powers will seek on July 13 to put the finishing touches to a historic nuclear deal, with both sides saying an accord ending a 13-year standoff lies tantalisingly within reach.

Iran plans to open 150 alcohol treatment centres, a health ministry official said on Monday, in an acknowledgement of the scale of abuse in a country where drinking is illegal.

The head of the ministry's drug abuse department, Dr Alireza Norouzi, told the ISNA news agency that the 150 day centres would provide special settings and educational courses to help people give up alcohol.

US Secretary of State John Kerry will meet his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif next week in Geneva ahead of a fresh round of nuclear talks, an Iranian official said Jan. 9.