Iran defiant as UN body meets

Tehran: As Iran attacks the US for "impudent threats" members of the UN Security Council were due to meet in Paris.

UNSC is meeting to discuss their response to a nuclear watchdog report that said the Islamic republic was violating demands to halt uranium enrichment.

The powerful council's five permanent members will Tuesday weigh up possible sanctions against a defiant Tehran, which has accused the United States of threatening it with nuclear attack.

But while the US, Britain and France are expected to back heavy trade embargoes, they face resistance from Russia and China, the other veto-wielding council nations.

Iran, which has the potential to develop nuclear weapons following its atomic breakthrough, has already dismissed the prospect of sanctions, saying Russia and China will not agree to them.

It has also complained to the United Nations about what it calls "illegal and insolent threats" by Washington - citing President George W Bush's refusal to rule out a nuclear strike on the country.

Iran announced last month it was ready to embark on a large scale uranium enrichment program.

It said it is legally entitled under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to provide fuel for civilian power plants.

An IAEA report released on Friday said that Iran had violated a 30-day Security Council deadline to stop its enrichment program.

Council members will discuss the report in Paris in preparation for a May 9 meeting in New York of foreign ministers from the top Security Council nations and Germany.

The United States has said it suspects the real aim of Tehran's fuel program is to produce nuclear weapons, a view backed by Britain and France.

Sanctions seen by these countries as a way of breaking the deadlock could result in a restriction of trade in equipment that has both civilian and military uses, as well as the banning of travel and freezing the assets of key Iranians who run and oversee the country's nuclear program.

But Iran's foreign minister was quoted on Tuesday as saying that Russia and China had officially informed Tehran they would not back sanctions or military action over the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.

China and Russia both have major energy interests in Iran, the world's fourth biggest oil exporter.

In 2005, more than 11 percent of China's crude imports came from Iran while Russia's LUKOIL is exploring the Anaran oilfield in western Iran.

Washington, meanwhile, is already drafting a schedule of restrictions which will evoke but fall short of those slapped on deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's regime in the 1990s.

"The general idea we have on Iran," US Ambassador John Bolton said in a recent interview, "is more targeted sanctions aimed at specific individuals responsible for the nuclear program, and the country's direction of the nuclear program."

He said targeted sanctions would also likely include "restricting trade in dual use and other sensitive items".

While the United States is currently focusing on targeted sanctions, Bolton did not rule out tougher measures against Iran if needed at some future date.

Between 1945 and 1990, the Security Council imposed sanctions only twice - against white-ruled Rhodesia in 1966 and apartheid South Africa in 1977.

But during the 1990s, the council imposed some form of sanctions against governments or rebel movements 12 times.