,
Iran flatly refused to suspend uranium enrichment despite moves at the UN Security Council to draft a sanctions resolution against it for failing to halt the sensitive nuclear work.
“The suspension is completely unacceptable and we have rejected it,” foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told reporters. “It has no place in Iran's peaceful nuclear programme.”
His comments marked an unequivocal refusal from Tehran to back down in the face of pressure to suspend uranium enrichment, a process which the West fears could be diverted towards making nuclear weapons.
“The greatest sanction would be for a generation to deprive its own people and future generations of nuclear technology,” he added.
In a meeting late on Friday, representatives of the five UN Security Council permanent members plus Germany agreed to discuss sanctions against Tehran after it failed to suspend sensitive uranium enrichment operations.
Senior US official Nicholas Burns said the so-called “5+1” group would start drafting this week a sanctions resolution, although he admitted finding a consensus on the extent of punitive measures would be difficult.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also maintained his defiant stance, brushing off the intensifying moves to impose sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran is interested in talks and negotiations, and resorting to the language of force and threats will have no results with Iran,” official media quoted him as saying.
Ahmadinejad also said in a meeting with his cabinet that Western powers “intend to achieve their aims through intimidation and threats”.
“But our people are strong, wise and steadfast, and will not back down on their rightful position,” he added, according to the ISNA news agency.
General Yahya Rahim Safavi, head of the Revolutionary Guards, warned that “in this sensitive situation we have to be ready to confront the probable foreign threats,” ISNA also reported.
Alaedin Borujerdi, the head of parliament's foreign affairs committee, said any hasty measures by the West would spark “as a consequence a reaction by the parliament and national security council.”
However the momentum towards imposing some kind of UN sanctions regime on Tehran appears strong after the London meeting, which gathered US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and top diplomats from the five other countries.
In a statement issued by host Britain, the group agreed to discuss sanctions and lamented Tehran's refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, but insisted that the door remains open to negotiations if Tehran were to back down.
Burns, the US under secretary of state for political affairs, said that work on a new Security Council resolution under Article 41 of the UN charter, which allows for diplomatic and economic sanctions, would start next week.
It remains to be seen what kind of sanctions regime will be acceptable to Russia and China, which have both always insisted on the importance of a diplomatic solution to the crisis.
Hosseini claimed the world powers were split over what action to take against Iran.
“Divisions have even appeared within the UN Security Council. With the policy of Iran's government, these divisions have become more apparent,” he said.
Iran's insistence on its right to enrich uranium lies at the heart of the crisis. The process can be used to make nuclear fuel and, in highly extended form, the fissile core of an atomic bomb.
Tehran insists its nuclear programme is solely for peaceful energy needs, vehemently rejecting US allegations that it is seeking to manufacture nuclear weapons.
Rice has said the United States wants a graduated series of sanctions, to be implemented through multiple UN resolutions that would ramp up pressure on Iran if it persists with its nuclear work.
The first set of measures is expected to focus on preventing the supply of material and funding for Iran's nuclear or ballistic missile programmes.
Other steps could include asset freezes and travel bans on officials linked to possible Iranian weapons programmes.
