US eyes global sanctions on Iran, report says

WASHINGTON - The US is pushing Europe and Japan to use sanctions to financially pressure Iran's leadership if diplomacy fails to resolve the dispute over the country's nuclear activities, the Washington Post has reported.

The newspaper said the plan would target every Iranian official the Bush administration sees as linked to nuclear enrichment.

It would also target terrorism, government corruption, suppression of religious or democratic freedom and violence in Iraq, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian territories.

The Tehran government's access to foreign currency and global markets would be restricted, its overseas accounts shut and assets held in Europe and Asia frozen, the newspaper reported, citing internal government memos and interviews with three US officials.

The plan was developed by a Treasury Department task force that reports directly to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the Washington Post said.

Consideration of global economic sanctions follows decades of unilateral sanctions imposed by the United States against Iran.

The United Nations is demanding that Iran halt enrichment activities that the West says are a cover for developing weapons. Iran says it only wants to make fuel for nuclear power.

Internal US assessments suggest sanctions would not impact Iran without hurting some US allies, the Washington Post said.

According to the report, US officials hope the allies will carry out the punitive measures if Iran refuses a package of incentives the Europeans are preparing to offer soon.

Separately, The New York Times reported that Iran appeared to have slowed its efforts to produce nuclear fuel, according to European diplomats who had reviewed reports from inspectors inside the country.

The newspaper quoted the diplomats as saying the slowdown [in uranium enrichment] could be an effort by Iran to cool tensions in the nuclear stand-off with the West and possibly for Washington to begin direct talks with Tehran.

"The pace is more diplomatic than technical," a senior European diplomat who monitors the Iranian programme was quoted as saying.

"They could probably have gone faster. But they don't want to provoke."

But the Times said Bush administration hard-liners believed any slowdown in enrichment might just be a tactical ploy by the government of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

- REUTERS