TEHRAN (FNA)- Iran’s 2009/10 budget is expected to be based on an oil price of $37.50 per barrel, a “logical” level in view of last year’s price fall, Oil Minister Gholam Hossein Nozari said Sunday. An Iranian newspaper last month said the government and a parliament committee had an initial …

TEHRAN (FNA)- Relations between Iraq and Iran are developing in a number of ways, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said during a visit to Iran. “The exchange of high ranking visits between the two country’s officials shows that the bilateral relations are developing in different areas,” Maliki said after a …

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iran plans to build new storage tanks on Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf waters in a bid to raise its storage capacity by 25%. Construction work of the planned 5 million-barrel storage tanks on Kharg Island is expected to be completed by the next 30 months, Managing …

TEHRAN (FNA)- A five per cent block of Bank Mellat shares is to be offered on the Tehran Stock Exchange. Bank Mellat shares will be on offer during Ten-Day Dawn ceremonies (31 January – 9 February), according to the deputy head of the Iran Privatization Organization (IPO), Esmaeel Gholami. Bank …

TEHRAN (FNA)- Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari urged the international community to play its role in ending brutal attacks against unarmed and innocent Palestinians in Gaza and said that Israeli attacks violated the UN Charter. Speaking in a meeting with Iranian Oil Minister and Special Envoy Gholam Hossein Nozari, who …

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that it was Iran’s duty to be by the side of Iraq. Ahmadinejad met here with visiting Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Saturday evening. “Our Islamic and humanitarian duty requires us to be incessantly by the side of Iraqi people,” he said. …

KABUL (AFP) – The deputy head of the NATO-led force that has more than 50,000 soldiers in Afghanistan helping to fight extremist insurgents has said security did not deteriorate last year as much as portrayed. A few “spectacular attacks” by the insurgents in 2008 had fed perceptions that security was …

Three months from a deadline for the completion of Macedonia’s new presidential residence, President Branko Crvenkovski’s cabinet is accusing the government of deliberate delays to the works. The president, who previously led the opposition Social Democrats, has in recent months clashed publicly with the current government led by the centre-right …

CAIRO (Reuters) – Egyptian police detained 20 members of the Muslim Brotherhood and deployed in force in the capital on Friday, ahead of demonstrations the Islamist group called to protest Israel’s offensive in Gaza. Hundreds of riot police and agents were deployed around key mosques in Cairo before the protest, …

LONDON (Reuters) – Britain has formally handed over responsibility for the running of Basra airport to Iraqi authorities, the Ministry of Defence said on Friday, a move that paves the way for Britain to withdraw from Iraq. The airport, on the outskirts of Iraq’s second largest city in the south …