European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana raised for the first time today the prospect of imposing sanctions on Iran over its nuclear programme.
In an interview with the Austrian newspaper Der Standard, published as EU foreign ministers were to begin a two-day meeting in Salzburg, Mr Solana did not rule out sanctions if Tehran fails to allay concerns that it is developing nuclear weapons.
The UN Security Council is due to take up Iran's case after an International Atomic Energy Agency board of governors meeting ended on Wednesday without an agreement among key powers on defusing the stand-off.
Ambassadors from permanent council members - the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China - meet again today to work out a statement the Western powers hope will be adopted by the 15 Security Council members next week.
"I do not rule out sanctions, but it depends on what kind of sanctions they are," Mr Solana was quoted saying.
"We certainly do not want to hurt the Iranian people [but] sanctions of some kind may not be ruled out at a later stage. Let us see what the Security Council will do. We must weigh all the options," he added.
The EU, led by France, Britain and Germany, started talks with Iran over two years ago in the hope of convincing it to scrap uranium enrichment, which can produce fuel for power plants or weapons.
The talks collapsed in August after Iran broke a suspension of enrichment-related work by resuming uranium processing, and a last-gasp meeting between the two sides a week ago failed to produce an agreement.