By Michael Adler
VIENNA, Aug 21, 2006 (AFP) - Iran has made it clear that it will refuse to suspend strategic nuclear fuel work when it responds to an international offer for an atomic deal on Tuesday, but the crucial deadline comes at the end of the month, diplomats and analysts say.
"We're giving them until the 31st of August to suspend uranium enrichment, and then the time has come to look at other measures," a European diplomat told AFP, alluding to possible UN Security Council sanctions.
On Tuesday, Tehran is to respond to a package of incentives offered by major powers in return for a freeze on uranium enrichment, amid Western fears that its nuclear power program is a cover for a weapons program, since uranium enrichment makes fuel for reactors but can also produce the raw material for atom bombs.
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Monday that his country would pursue its nuclear program "with strength."
For his part, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said during a visit to South Africa on Monday: "We have completed our consideration (of the incentives package) and we hope, based on cooperation, negotiation, and respecting the rights of Iran to have nuclear technology, to remove any questions to catch a comprehensive solution."
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi had said Sunday that Tehran would not freeze its nuclear activities. "The issue of suspension means returning to the past. It is not on the agenda of the Islamic republic of Iran," Asefi told reporters.
The Security Council has given Iran until August 31 to halt enrichment and reprocessing activities or face possible sanctions, and the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is to verify whether Iran has complied with this deadline.
Iran will be responding Tuesday to an offer of talks on trade, technology and security benefits made in June by the five permanent UN Security Council members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- plus Germany.
Asefi said: "We are in the final stage of our studies on the package. Since the package had different dimensions, our response will be also multi-dimensional."
An Asian diplomat close to the Vienna-based IAEA said the Iranians will try to buy time with their response.
"They will give a wishy-washy reply. They will leave some kind of fig leaf to have some support. They don't want to confront the international community now," the diplomat said.
A negative Iranian response would set up a confrontation, diplomats and analysts said.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and top Iranian nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani are open to "further contacts" about Tehran's nuclear ambitions, Solana said Monday.
But Mark Fitzpatrick, a non-proliferation expert at London's International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), said Iran is losing its room to maneuver.
"Come August 31, the IAEA will report that there is no suspension, and then the Security Council will consider the next step, which is considering a resolution to impose sanctions," Fitzpatrick said.
"We are heading to further escalation of the confrontation," Fitzpatrick said.
Iran has said it is ready for sanctions, which will almost certainly be at first limited measures such as banning the travel of Iranian nuclear scientists and officials involved in the atomic program.
"It (sanctions) would be more harmful to them (the West) than for us. We have been under informal sanctions since the 1979 Islamic revolution and we can deal with the consequences by planning," Asefi said.
In the meantime, Iran is preparing for any possible military action over its nuclear activities and showed off new tactical missiles on Sunday during nationwide war games.
Iran test-fired a short-range missile in a demonstration of its "readiness to respond to any threat," state television reported.
Iran has remained defiant since a UN resolution was adopted on July 31 after Tehran ignored a previous non-binding deadline and failed to respond to the incentives package, although it says it is still open to negotiations.
Tehran, one of the world's top oil producers, insists its nuclear programme is a peaceful effort to generate electricity and notes that it has the right to enrich uranium as a signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
