Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad today launched anniversary celebrations for Iran’s Islamic Revolution with a defiant promise to push ahead with the country’s controversial nuclear programme.

Iran says it needs time to review a plan proposed by the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog agency in which it will hold off on imposing sanctions if Tehran suspends uranium enrichment.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana today reacted cautiously to a proposal from a senior Iranian nuclear official that France enrich Iran’s uranium on Iranian soil to satisfy international demands for foreign supervision of the Islamic republic’s nuclear program.

A top Iranian official proposed today that France create a consortium to enrich Iran’s uranium, to satisfy international demands for outside monitoring of Tehran’s nuclear programme.

Iranian officials insisted the country was determined to push ahead with its nuclear program but were silent today over a new package of incentives to give up uranium enrichment amid intensified world pressure to accept the deal.

An Iranian nuclear official said today that the Tehran government was ready for a conditional return to "intrusive" inspections but that uranium enrichment will continue.

Diplomats in Vienna said they expected UN nuclear chief Mohamed ElBaradei to find that Iran failed to meet today’s deadline for complying with council requests to suspend uranium enrichment, setting the stage for a confrontation at the Security Council.

IRAN’S president declared yesterday his country would not retreat on its uranium enrichment activities.

Iran came under increasing international condemnation yesterday – including from allies Russia and China – after announcing it enriched uranium for the first time, but it insisted it will push ahead to dramatically expand the program that the United Nations had demanded it scrap.

IRAN intends to enrich uranium on a scale hundreds of times larger than its current level, the country's deputy nuclear chief said yesterday.

Iran’s deputy nuclear chief today said Iran intended to move toward large-scale uranium enrichment involving 54,000 centrifuges, signalling the country’s resolve to expand a programme the United Nations has demanded it halt.

IRAN has made a last-ditch proposal to break the deadlock over its nuclear programme as world powers warned it still risked being taken to the UN Security Council within a week for possible sanctions.

Iran and Russia have agreed in principle to establish a joint uranium enrichment venture, a breakthrough in talks on a US-backed Kremlin proposal aimed at easing concerns that Tehran wants to build nuclear weapons.

Iran and Russia today agreed in principle to establish a joint uranium enrichment venture, a breakthrough in talks on a US-backed Kremlin proposal aimed at easing concerns that Tehran wants to build nuclear weapons.

Iran broke UN seals on its nuclear enrichment facility, pledging only to conduct research, but the international nuclear watchdog said Tehran also planned small-scale enrichment of uranium – a process that can produce fuel for nuclear weapons.

IRAN removed UN seals on uranium enrichment equipment and resumed nuclear research yesterday, defying demands it maintain a two-year freeze on its nuclear programme.

Iran’s row with the West over its nuclear programme escalated today with America warning of international sanctions.

Officials of the UN nuclear agency removed seals on Iran’s nuclear facilities today and research work resumed, said the deputy head of the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran.

IRAN has decided to resume research into nuclear fuel production, but would not enrich uranium, a top official said yesterday.

Iran has decided to resume the research into nuclear fuel production that has long been suspended, a top nuclear official said on state television today.

The UN nuclear watchdog agency’s 35-nation board adopted a resolution Thursday expressing “serious concern” over Iran’s decision this week to resume uranium conversion – a process that some fear could be used to help build a bomb.

Iran confirmed today it had converted 37 tons of raw uranium into gas needed to enrich uranium just before suspending all uranium enrichment related activities last year, a top nuclear official said.

Iran’s president escorted reporters on an unprecedented visit to the once-secret Natanz nuclear complex today, giving a glimpse into the underground uranium enrichment plant the US and Europe demand be shut down.

Five UN nuclear inspectors arrived in Tehran today to try to confirm whether Iran has stopped suspicious nuclear activities – including, as it has twice promised to do, suspending the building and assembling of centrifuges for uranium enrichment.