Annan fails to persuade Iran to halt nuclear work

UN chief Kofi Annan has won a pledge from Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to support a UN resolution bringing peace to Lebanon, but was warned Iran would not suspend sensitive nuclear work before negotiations on uranium enrichment.

After talks with the president yesterday, Mr Annan said that Mr Ahmadinejad assured him Tehran would support the implementation of the UN resolution that ended the fighting in Lebanon and was ready to negotiate over its nuclear programme.

He added Mr Ahmadinejad had agreed that Iran, which backs the Lebanese Shi’ite group, Hezbollah, would “do everything to support the territorial integrity of Lebanon and the independence of Lebanon”.

“Tehran will work together with us in a collective effort to reconstruct Lebanon,” he added.

Mr Annan’s 10-day tour of the Middle East has been mainly aimed at implementing the UN resolution which halted a 34-day conflict that killed more than 1,200 people in Lebanon.

State radio quoted Mr Ahmadinejad as saying, “Iran is ready to help in the reconstruction of Lebanon and seriously take part in any group activity to rebuild Lebanon.” He also said Israel and its allies, Britain and the United States, “should compensate Lebanon for the damages inflicted”.

Mr Ahmadinejad, meanwhile, told Mr Annan he was prepared to negotiate on Iran’s nuclear programme, but would not accept a suspension of uranium enrichment before talks, rejecting a key demand of Western countries.

Annan expressed hope that the Islamic republic and international community would find a way to move forward at talks between EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran’s top national security official Mr Ali Larijani this week. Iran has defied Western demands to suspend uranium enrichment, a process that can be used to make nuclear fuel and, in extended form, the explosive core of an atomic bomb. Its rejection of a UN deadline which expired last Thursday to halt enrichment has left it facing a push by the US for the Security Council to impose sanctions on Tehran.

Mr Annan, in a weekend newspaper interview, expressed reservations over the US drive to impose sanctions, warning patience would prove more effective than sanctions in persuading Iran to suspend sensitive uranium enrichment work.

The UN chief told reporters he had had a “very good discussion” with Mr Ahmadinejad on the nuclear issue which he would discuss with the five permanent Security Council members plus Germany which offered Iran an incentives package to suspend enrichment.

Foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said he expected the European Union to take a stand on its response to the offer aimed at ending the standoff, insisting negotiations were the only way out of the crisis.

Mr Solana said during talks in Finland with EU foreign ministers at the weekend that the European Union was giving Iran a “short” time, but no set deadline, to move into talks on suspending uranium enrichment.

The United States accuses Iran of seeking nuclear weapons, a charge fiercely denied by Tehran, which insists that its nuclear programme is solely aimed at providing civilian energy.