Iran leader vows nuclear defiance

Mr Ahmadinejad said the Iranian people would defend their rights

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said his country will defend its nuclear programme to the bitter end. His comments came a day after the UN nuclear body confirmed Iran had ignored a deadline to stop uranium enrichment.

Mr Ahmadinejad said Iran could not show weakness “in front of the enemy”, saying previous compromises had led to increased demands from the West.

Permanent UN Security Council members and Germany will meet on Monday to discuss further sanctions against Iran.

The UN Security Council had given Iran until 21 February to halt uranium enrichment.

But the UN’s nuclear agency, the IAEA, concluded in a report on Thursday that Iran was expanding rather than halting its enrichment programme, defying a UN resolution of December 2006.

‘Vigilant people’

Iran says the UN call for it to stop uranium enrichment is unacceptable, as it has no legal basis.

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“The Iranian people are vigilant and will defend all their rights to the end,” Iranian news agency Isna quoted Mr Ahmadinejad as saying, at a rally in northern Iran on Friday.

“If we show weakness in front of the enemy the expectations will increase but if we stand against them, because of this resistance they will retreat.”

In a Friday prayers sermon broadcast on state radio, former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani also said threats of further sanctions would not work.

“They will not get a result this way, it will just make problems for themselves, the world and especially our region,” he said.

He said Iran was willing to give Western powers “the necessary guarantees” if they returned to the negotiating table.

‘Peaceful purposes’

Representatives of the five permanent Security Council members - the US, UK, France, Russia and China - plus Germany will meet in London for talks on drafting a second resolution sanctioning Iran on Monday.

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German Chancellor Angela Merkel, speaking at a press conference with French President Jacques Chirac on Friday, said the door “remains open” for negotiations with Tehran.

But, she said, the report made clear Iran was not fulfilling its obligations and therefore it was right that the path led back to the UN Security Council.

Meanwhile Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing has backed a diplomatic resolution to the dispute, China’s state news agency Xinhua reports.

Mr Li telephoned his Iranian counterpart Manouchehr Mottaki to express Beijing’s desire “to peacefully resolve” the nuclear issue, Xinhua says.

US Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns, who will take part in the talks, said Iran was “effectively thumbing its nose at the international community”.

Tehran denies Western claims it is secretly trying to build nuclear arms, saying its nuclear programme is for purely peaceful, energy-producing purposes.

While enriched uranium is used as fuel for nuclear reactors, highly enriched uranium can also be used to make nuclear bombs.