Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Jul. 07 – In Iran one person becomes addicted to drugs every three minutes, according to the head of the Education and Prevention Unit of the Office to Combat Drugs. “Every three minutes one person in society becomes addicted to drugs”, Hamid Sarami told an anti-narcotics committee in the Iranian city of Hamedan (western Iran) today.

Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Jul. 07 – A man was publicly hanged at dawn on Tuesday in the town of Salmas, northwest Iran, accused of rape, according to a state-run daily.
The daily Sharq identified the man by only his first name, Hajan, and said that he was from a village called Mafanjouq. He was hanged in public at Kargar Square in Salmas.

Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Jul. 07 – Iraqi Defence Minister Sa’adun al-Dulaimi, in a joint press conference with Iranian Defence Minister Ali Shamkhani, announced today that the main Iranian opposition group Mojahedin-e Khalq (MeK) could continue to remain at its base on Iraqi soil, despite pressure from Tehran which seeks to have members of the group extradited.

Iran Focus: Dubai, Jul. 06 – In an interview with the Kuwaiti news agency, the Secretary-General of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) today sharply criticised Iran’s Foreign Ministry for using threatening language against GCC member Bahrain following the publication of a caricature in a Bahraini daily mocking Iran’s Supreme Leader.

Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Jul. 06 – Some 215 of the 290 Iranian Majlis (Parliament) deputies issued a public statement today attacking “pseudo-democracies” and “enemies of the Islamic Republic” for criticising Iran’s presidential elections as undemocratic.