France's foreign minister warned last night that the world should prepare for war if Iran obtains nuclear weapons and said European leaders were considering economic sanctions against it.
Talks and two sets of UN Security Council sanctions have failed to persuade Iran to stop its uranium enrichment programme, which can produce fuel for nuclear power plants as well as material used in atomic weapons.
Iran insists its atomic activities are aimed only at producing energy, but the United States, its European allies and other world powers suspect Iranian authorities of seeking nuclear weapons.
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, speaking on RTL radio, called for "more effective sanctions" against Iran if it continues to resist the demands to suspend uranium enrichment.
"We will not accept that such a bomb is made. We must prepare ourselves for the worst," he said, specifying that could mean a war. He did not elaborate on what kind of preparations that would entail.
"We have decided, while negotiations are under way . . . to prepare for eventual sanctions outside the United Nations, which would be European sanctions," he said.
In Washington, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said the Bush administration is committed, for now, to using diplomatic and economic means to counter the potential nuclear threat from Iran.
Iran's foreign minister was quoted as saying on state television that enriched uranium fuel is ready to be shipped from Russia to Iran's first nuclear power plant.
AP