EU offers to back Iran oil pipe routes from Central Asia

TEHRAN - Iran said on Friday the European Union had offered to support it as the main transit route for oil and gas from Central Asia as part of a package of incentives meant to persuade Iran to freeze its nuclear fuel activities.

"In the proposal, they have supported the idea of Iran being the main energy transit route to Europe from Central Asia," a senior Iranian close to the EU negotiations told Reuters.

Iran repeatedly threatened this week to resume uranium processing, a move that would end two years of talks and could lead to its referral to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions.

Earlier, Britain, Germany and France submitted proposals to Iran for economic and political co-operation to help persuade it to abandon activities that might be used to make a nuclear bomb.

The three European Union countries are also planning to call a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency -- the UN's nuclear watchdog -- early next week to warn Tehran against restarting sensitive nuclear work, diplomats said.

Iran says it aims only to generate electricity and has a right to a peaceful nuclear programme.

The main route for crude from Kazakh oilfields to world markets is now via the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) to a terminal near the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk.

A rival pipeline through Turkey, the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan route, is to start carrying Azeri crude in the Autumn, with capacity set to rise to one million bpd by the end of the decade.

Iran's arch-enemy the United States has long jostled with Russia and Iran to control oil and gas export routes from the Caspian basin to world markets.

- REUTERS