Iran's deputy oil minister said Monday he hoped for a total lifting of international sanctions later this year if a nuclear deal is struck with world powers by June 30.

Amirhossein Zamani-Nia also told the oil ministry's Shana news agency that the lifting of sanctions could help Iran's oil and gas sectors attract billions of dollars in foreign investment.

The United States has done "nothing" to help Iraq's army battle jihadists in Ramadi, according to a senior Iranian general involved in the fight against the Islamic State group.

Qassem Suleimani, the Revolutionary Guards' commander of foreign operations, hit out at Washington after Pentagon chief Ashton Carter said Iraqi forces "failed to fight" in Ramadi, which has fallen to IS.

Australia on Monday appointed a counter-terrorism chief to coordinate security agencies, while pointing to the United States and Britain to justify a proposal to strip citizenship from dual nationals linked to jihadists.

Like many countries, Australia is grappling with heightened threats from "home-grown" extremists with several alleged terror plots foiled this year inspired by the Islamic State group.

A senior Iranian military official told parliament on Sunday the armed forces need a bigger budget to confront the Islamic State group whose influence is growing in neighboring countries.

"We have to face a new threat in the region. Terrorist groups are close to our borders," General Ahmad-Reza Pourdastan who commands Iran's ground forces told parliament, media reported.

United Nations officials in the Horn of Africa port of Djibouti said Saturday they had taken charge of the aid cargo carried by an Iranian boat headed for war-torn Yemen.

The vessel, the MV Shahed, is carrying 2,500 tonnes of aid including flour, rice, canned food, medical supplies and bottled water, all urgently needed in the conflict-wracked state just across the Gulf of Aden from Djibouti.

Regional Shiite power Iran on Friday denounced a suicide bombing at a Shiite mosque in Saudi Arabia that killed and wounded several people.

Official IRNA news agency quoted foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham as "vigorously condemning" the attack, which has been claimed by the Islamic State jihadist group.

Al-Mustaqbal bloc described on Friday alleged threats by Hizbullah MP Mohammed Raad against the movement's officials as an “aggression on civil peace,” saying they were a reflection of “terrorism” proliferating in the Middle East because of the party's main backer Iran.

Raad's threat to al-Mustaqbal Secretary General Ahmed Hariri and Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi, “which is assault on civil peace, is the other face of the extremist and terrorist movements that are proliferating in the region because of the way Iran behaves and orders its followers,” the bloc said in a statement.

The U.S. Treasury placed restrictive sanctions Thursday on an Iraqi middleman company which obtained and sold nine Airbus aircraft to Iran's already-blacklisted Mahan Air.

The Treasury said Al-Naser Airlines, based in Iraq, was used as a "cutout" to procure eight Airbus A340 aircraft and one A320 for transfer early this month to Mahan Air, which was placed under sanctions in 2011 for providing transport services to Iran's Revolutionary Guards, or IRGC-QF, and Lebanon's Hizbullah.

A senior Iranian military official warned on Thursday that any Israeli attack would unleash a firestorm of missiles on its cities fired by the Islamic republic's Hizbullah allies in Lebanon.

The Lebanese group has more than 80,000 rockets ready to fire at Tel Aviv and Haifa, said General Yahya Rahim Safavi, military adviser to Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

After a Swiss court reportedly ordered an Israeli oil firm to compensate Iran over a scrapped joint venture, Israel said Thursday that its laws prohibited any payment to "the enemy."

Iranian state news agency IRNA said Wednesday that the court had found  Israel's Trans-Asian Oil (TAO) liable for payment of $1.1 billion to the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC).