Iran will not suspend uranium enrichment despite international pressure, Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said today.
The official IRNA news agency quoted Mr Kharrazi saying Iran had a "legitimate right to use nuclear technology". However, he said Iran had no plans to quit the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Mr Kharrazi said that nuclear weapons contravene the Islamic republic's religious values. He also repeated Iran's assertion that it was committed to a Middle East free of nuclear weapons, where the biggest threat to security was Israel's nuclear capability.
Iran's representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mr Ali Akbar Salehi, has said Iran is getting a rough deal from the NPT.
"The NPT is a discriminatory treaty. We never consider withdrawing from it but if the West keeps up its pressure without reason . . . staying in this treaty has no meaning," he said.
A suspension of uranium enrichment is one of the demands of an October 31st deadline set by the IAEA, which has called on the Islamic Republic to prove it is not developing nuclear weaponry.
Enriched uranium can be used to fuel nuclear power stations, but if enriched further it can be used in atomic weapons.