TEHRAN (Fars News Agency) Iran and the Italian power company Edison were nearing on an agreement to pump more than a billion cubic feet of Iranian gas to Europe per day, the Iranian oil minister said last week.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency) Iran’s former nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani stated that international circumstances and regional changes, including “the weakening of the exclusive role of America in the region,” are encouraging Egypt and Iran to increase their mutual cooperation.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency) Iran expects deliveries of natural gas from neighboring Turkmenistan to be restored by the end of the week, an Iranian official said on Tuesday.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency) Iranian scientists said Monday that the country’s first cloned sheep is thriving 15 months after birth, eating well and frolicking among a flock of normal sheep.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency) Iran believes in the need for talks with the US over Iraq in principle, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Seyed Mohammad Ali Hosseini said, assuring that Tehran and Washington would attend a fourth round of talks on Iraq’s security at ambassadorial level.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency) Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad here on Monday felicitated Alvaro Colom on his election as Guatemala’s president.

US military deaths, suicide bombings and opium production hit record highs in 2007. Taliban militants killed more than 925 Afghan police. But US officials insist things are looking up.

BAGHDAD – The death toll in a suicide bombing on the northern outskirts of Baghdad on Monday reached 11, including five children and six neighborhood patrol volunteers, an Interior Ministry source said.

ISMAILIA, Egypt – Stranded Palestinian haj pilgrims protesting at Egypt’s refusal to allow them to return to Gaza through a Hamas-controlled crossing, smashed furniture and windows at a shelter on Monday, a security source said.

ISLAMABAD – Pakistan has suffered colossal losses in rioting that erupted when opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated with damage of about $200 million to the railways alone, the government said on Monday.