Speaker Nabih Berri has refused to discuss about fears that next year's presidential elections were under threat, saying he would deal with the issue when the Constitutional deadline approaches.

In remarks carried by al-Joumhouria newspaper published on Saturday, Berri said that “he would discuss about the elections before March 25, when the 60-day Constitutional deadline for the election of a new president starts.”

Iran will not dismantle its nuclear facilities, President Hassan Rouhani said in an interview with The Financial Times published Friday after a historic deal between Tehran and world powers.

Asked by the newspaper whether dismantling Iran's atomic facilities was a "red line" for the Islamic republic, Rouhani replied: "100 percent".

Syria's prime minister arrived in Tehran Friday for talks with the leaders of close ally Iran ahead of a peace conference aimed at ending his country's civil war , the state broadcaster reported.

During his three-day stay, Wael al-Halqi will meet President Hassan Rouhani, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and National Supreme Security Council chief Ali Shamkhani, the report said.

Iran's six-month freeze of its nuclear program agreed with world powers in Geneva will start by early January, Tehran's envoy to the U.N. atomic watchdog indicated Friday.

"We expect that either at the end of December or the beginning of January we should start implementing the measures agreed by both sides," Reza Najafi, envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency, told reporters.

Iran's landmark nuclear deal is "a great opportunity" for expanding strained ties between Tehran and the United Arab Emirates, President Hassan Rouhani said Thursday.

Iran struck a breakthrough deal with the United States and five other Western powers on Sunday, accepting strict constraints on its nuclear program for the first time in a decade in exchange for partial sanctions relief.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi will not visit Iran any time soon despite receiving several invitations, Bkirki sources said in comments published in al-Joumhouria newspaper on Friday.

“If the Patriarch was going to travel to Tehran we would inform the public,” the sources said.

The U.N. atomic watchdog said Thursday that Iran has invited it to visit the heavy water production plant at its Arak site on December 8, for the first time since August 2011.

"I can inform the board that we have received an invitation from Iran to visit the Heavy Water Production Plant at Arak on 8 December," International Atomic Energy Agency chief Yuyika Amano said.

A Jordan-based scientific research project whose members include Iran and the Palestinian Authority has chosen an Israeli as vice president, the candidate's university confirmed.

Scientists from states participating in the project elected Eliezer Rabinovici, a physics professor at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, as vice-president of the Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East (SESAME), the university told AFP.

U.S. President Barack Obama called Saudi king Abdullah late Wednesday to discuss latest developments in the Middle East, a report said, days after world powers struck a nuclear deal with Iran.

The landmark accord, which would curb parts of Iran's nuclear program in return for some relief from international sanctions, has received only a cautious welcome from Riyadh, which fears Tehran's regional ambitions.

Iran's six-month temporary rollback of its nuclear activities agreed to in the recent deal has not begun and the start date has not yet been set, a spokesman for world powers' chief negotiator said Wednesday.

"The actual date for the beginning of the six-month period of the first step has yet to be decided," Michael Mann, spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, told Agence France Presse.