Iran on Tuesday launched naval maneuvers in the Gulf, and announced plans for another exercise in the strategic Strait of Hormuz later this week, media reports said.

Revolutionary Guards naval units began a four-day exercise inside Iranian waters at South Pars, a joint gas field between Iran and Qatar, a Guards spokesman was quoted as saying by the Fars news agency.

Police in Tehran said on Tuesday they had arrested more than 100 "thugs" as part of an operation to curb violent crime after the brutal assault of a man was captured on a surveillance camera.

"This (Tuesday) morning we apprehended over 100 thugs, some of whom had (criminal) records," the commander of Tehran metropolitan police, Hossein Sajedinia, said on state television.

Iran has issued a travel warning to its citizens against visiting arch-foe the United States, an official said, after the death of an Iranian national reportedly following a grilling by U.S. customs officials.

"Iranian citizens are advised to avoid non-essential travels to the U.S. and, in case of visit, to exercise maximum caution," foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said in remarks reported by the ISNA news agency.

Iran is engaged in a "smart economic war" with Western powers whose sanctions against its nuclear program are hurting some Iranians, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Saturday.

"Targeted sanctions, which the enemies say are supposed to be crippling, have led to a drop in our oil" sales, Ahmadinejad said in a live interview on state television, referring to an oil embargo imposed by the European Union.

Unknown gunmen killed 11 people as they prepared to illegally leave Pakistan in the southwestern province of Baluchistan, officials said on Saturday.

The gunmen, riding motorcycles, attacked a convoy on Friday night in Pakistan's Gwadar district near the border with Iran, some 1,600 kilometers (1,000 miles) southwest of Quetta.

A suspicious car was located on Saturday near the residence of former Alawite MP Ali Eid in the Akkar town of of Hekr al-Daheri, the state-run National News Agency reported.

An Internal Security Forces unit arrived swiftly at the scene to search the Mercedes.

A major $633-billion defense spending bill was awaiting President Barack Obama's signature Saturday after the US Senate gave it its stamp of approval, tightening penalties on Iran, funding the war in Afghanistan and boosting security at U.S. missions worldwide.

The legislation passed the Senate 81-14 Friday, despite furious opposition from Republican Senator Rand Paul, who criticized removal of an amendment that would have provided Americans with protection against indefinite military detention.

The United States on Friday sanctioned four Iranian companies, including one accused of providing weapons to the Syrian regime's crackdown.

The Treasury Department said SAD Import Export Company shipped weapons to the Syrian Armed Forces on behalf of Iran's Defense Industries Organization, which it accused of being used by the government to "assist" the Syrian regime's crackdown.

The U.N. General Assembly on Thursday voted overwhelmingly to rebuke Syria, Iran and North Korea for human rights abuses.

With Syria's conflict worsening by the day, a resolution condemning the Syrian government and its allied militias came as a diplomatic blow for President Bashar Assad.

Eight people were killed when a coal mine collapsed a day ago in central Iran, a local official was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency on Wednesday, updating an earlier death toll of four.

"We managed to get five bodies out last night, and three bodies were taken out today," said Ahmad Talebian Moqadam, governor of Tabas city where the accident occurred on Tuesday morning.