Payvandnews – Iran says it has launched a train service to Turkey’s Van after a hiatus of about three years with officials expressing hope that it would help increase the number of tourists travelling on either side of the border.

Iran-HRM – Despite a global campaign to save the life of Sufi bus driver Mohammad Salas, reports indicate this 51-year old member of Iran’s Sufi religious minority group has been executed early this morning in what Amnesty International called a “huge miscarriage of justice.” Salas’s family were instructed to receive the corpse from Behesht-e-Sakineh Cemetery of Karaj, west of Tehran.

Amnesty – Mohamed Salas was executed by the Iranian authorities at dawn on 18 June 2018. 

RFL/RE – Iranian authorities have executed a man convicted of killing three police officers during clashes involving members of a Sufi order, despite calls to stop his execution.

Radiofarda – Two members of the Iranian Parliament (Majles) have responded to Mashad’s firebrand Friday prayer leader Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda’s accusation of treason, with counter-accusations implying the ayatollah was involved with threat messages sent to MPs.

Radiofarda – A member of the Islamic Republic’s Expediency Council, a body that advises the Supreme Leader, has cautioned about foreign intelligence services infiltrating state institutes in Iran.

Radiofarda – Security forces have arrested one of the men suspected of kidnapping dozens of girls and young women in the city of Iranshahr, southeast Iran, the local prosecutor has announced.

Iran-HRM – A porter in Iran who had lost one of his eyes and legs to a mine recently has been fined $5,475 for illegal border crossing and compensation for the mine.

Iran-HRM – Gonabadi Dervish women imprisoned in Qarchak Prison of Varamin were severely beaten on Wednesday, June 13, 2018, by special prison guards using batons and shockers.

Al-Arabia – Iranian President Hassan Rouhani will visit Austria and Switzerland next month as part of a campaign by Tehran to secure continued European backing for the 2015 nuclear accord.