The EU will resume crunch talks with Iran over its disputed nuclear work on Thursday, officials said, as world power consultations at an atomic watchdog meeting betrayed differences over whether to crack down on Tehran.
European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana was likely to try to pin down Iranian negotiator Ali Larijani on what EU diplomats said was a tentative offer from him to consider temporarily halting enrichment of uranium for nuclear fuel.
The United States, Iran's arch-adversary and spearheading efforts to draw up punitive UN sanctions against Tehran over suspicions it is secretly trying to build atom bombs, has said it has no knowledge of any such offer.
Solana's spokeswoman, Cristina Gallach, said the meeting would be held on Thursday and was intended to "prepare the conditions in order if possible to start negotiations."
An EU diplomat said the talks would be in Paris. The last round of talks was in Vienna on Saturday and Sunday. Western leaders condemned Iran's disregard of an August 31 UN Security Council deadline to suspend its uranium enrichment programme, which Iran insists is meant only to make electricity.
The Islamic Republic, while indicating openness to negotiate on a timing and duration of suspension, refuses to take that step before negotiations on a big power offer of trade incentives not to develop nuclear fuel.
The US, British, French, German, Russian and Chinese foreign ministers will meet on the fringes of the UN General Assembly in New York next week to discuss proceeding to sanctions if there has been no diplomatic breakthrough by then.
Washington made clear to the IAEA board that Iran's defiance should trigger steps to sanctions but "EU3" allies Britain, France and Germany omitted mention of punitive action and championed last-ditch talks despite the violated deadline.
"Given Iran's history of deception, lack of transparency, provocative behaviour and disregard for its international obligations, we must take further steps to persuade Iran to abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions," US envoy Gregory Schulte told the 35-nation board in Vienna.
"We are convinced that Iran is aggressively pursuing the technology, material and know-how to build nuclear weapons. The time has come for the (UN) Security Council to back international diplomacy with international sanctions," he said.
"Sanctions will not signal an end to diplomacy" aimed at getting Iran to stop enriching uranium in exchange for trade incentives meant to further persuade Iran not to pursue a nuclear fuel programme, he said.
"(But) Iran's leaders must understand that their choices have consequences...," Schulte added. "We are already working with other members of the Security Council on a resolution that would lay out very specific sanctions," Gregory Schulte, US ambassador to the watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency, said in an interview.
"We want to hear one very clear message coming back through the line of communications (between Solana and Larijani), and that is that Iran is suspending... If we don't hear that, we are moving forward with the sanctions resolution," he told Reuters.
But Washington's fellow veto-holders on the Council, China and Russia, as well as Germany and France and other EU nations are wary of cornering the world's No 4 oil exporter and, to varying degrees, want more time to find a diplomatic compromise.
Such dissension has handicapped efforts to rein in Iran, which aims to expand its pilot enrichment operation and has hindered IAEA probes into the programme, and it showed on the sidelines of an IAEA governing board meeting, diplomats said.
They said the six major powers could not agree on a joint statement to the 35-nation board, pointing to continued divergences between Washington, with its push for sanctions, and the others who prefer continued dialogue.
One EU diplomat said Britain, Washington's staunchest ally, was to some extent fence-siting between the two options. Asked about reservations over punishing Iran, Schulte said: "No one is enthusiastic about moving forward toward sanctions. The goal even with sanctions is still a diplomatic solution.
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