IRAN: Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad yesterday declared it was pointless for Europe to devise an economic and political incentive package if it required Tehran to stop enriching uranium.
This statement effectively pulled the rug from under the latest international diplomatic effort before it even began.
The Iranian leader spoke on state television after returning from Indonesia, where he was warmly welcomed and won developing nations' support for the peaceful production of nuclear energy.
Mr Ahmadinejad said proposals being shaped by the EU were "invalid" if "they want to offer us things they call incentives in return for renouncing our rights".
Refusing to budge in his campaign to assert Iranian regional power and leadership, he said opponents of the country's nuclear programme were "living in the era of colonialism" and did not respect Iran's sovereignty.
Mr Ahmadinejad's remarks were clearly aimed at EU foreign ministers meeting today in Brussels to consider sweetening a package of incentives that would entice Iran to suspend uranium enrichment - an issue that has now reached the UN Security Council but was put on hold to give the EU more time for diplomacy.
A document posted on the EU's website says the ministers are likely to express the bloc's "preparedness to support Iran's development of a safe, sustainable and proliferation-proof civilian nuclear programme, if international concerns were fully addressed".
But EU officials said no major progress on a final proposal could be expected at the Brussels meeting. The plan would be held in reserve until after talks among non-proliferation officials from the five permanent members of the Security Council next Friday in London.