French, German and British diplomats began an intensive round of worldwide lobbying yesterday to try to maximise a vote on Iran in Vienna early next month over its suspect nuclear weapons programme.
The Europeans, backed by the US, are confident of securing a majority of the 35 board members of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN watchdog, for referral of Iran to the UN security council.
But there are countries whose vote they cannot count on, such as Syria, Belarus, Cuba and Venezuela, and there are question marks over countries such as Algeria and Libya.
The main focus of the diplomatic push will be Moscow and Beijing, both of which are on the board and have vetoes at the security council. Neither committed itself to supporting the referral when they met the Europeans and the US in London on Monday.
Gernot Erler, Germany's deputy foreign minister, yesterday described the London talks as "difficult".
Philippe Douste-Blazy, the French foreign minister, speaking on the eve of today's visit to Moscow said: "France will deploy all its efforts to ensure the international community is united . . . for the credibility of the agency and the multilateral non-proliferation system, and above all for regional stability."
He put Iran at the top of the agenda for talks in Moscow with Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, who distanced himself from the European position yesterday.
Mr Lavrov, recalling how international sanctions had failed in Iraq, said: "Sanctions are in no way the best, or the only, way to solve the problem."
A Russian compromise, in which Iran would carry out uranium enrichment in Russia, was still on the table, Mr Lavrov said.
But a British official said: "I think Iran is playing with the Russia proposal for tactical reasons."
The Europeans said negotiations with Iran had reached a dead end last week. But Kong Quan, a spokesman for the Chinese foreign ministry, said yesterday there was hope they could be restarted.
AP adds: A German and a French man arrested after their boat allegedly strayed into Iranian waters while they were on holiday have each been sentenced to 18 months in prison in Iran, the wife of the German said today.
Donald Klein, a 52-year-old sculptor, and his French friend were arrested on November 29th and put on trial for entering Iranian territorial waters during a fishing trip in the Straits of Hormuz.