ARAB-EUROPEAN RELATIONS - Feb 1 - Tehran Cools On Russia Offer.

Iran's top security official Ali Larijani, says that he saw no "signs of life" in a Russian proposal floated as a compromise under which Moscow would allay international concerns over Tehran's nuclear programme by enriching uranium in Russia. His comments came just days after he expressed optimism about the proposal on a visit to Moscow. Some had hoped the proposal would be a way out of the stand-off involving Tehran and the west which on Thursday moves to the IAEA. Russian and Chinese diplomats are in Tehran to discuss the crisis and there is a meeting of Russian and Iranian officials scheduled for mid-February in Moscow. But Larijani said that Moscow's proposal could be studied only "under normal conditions" and not under "the current radical atmosphere". He warned on Feb 1 that Tehran would resume all suspended parts of its nuclear programme "as quickly as possible" if today's board meeting of the IAEA, in Vienna, sent Iran's case to the UN Security Council. He repeated previous policy that if the IAEA voted to involve the council - as a meeting of the five permanent members (P5) of the council including Russia recommended on Jan 30 - Iran would end its two-year suspension of uranium enrichment and stop implementing the additional protocol of the NPT, under which Tehran accepts IAEA inspections. "Natanz [Iran's enrichment plant] is ready and we need only report to the IAEA to resume activities", he said. Iran would react in the same way if sent to the council, he stressed, regardless of whether the IAEA used the words "inform", "report" or "refer". He said it was irrelevant whether the IAEA asked for a council discussion in March rather than immediately, thereby dismissing a submission from France, Germany and the UK yesterday that would give Iran a month to reinstate its suspension of uranium enrichment. The resolution asks IAEA chief Mohammad ElBaradei, "to report to the Security Council of the UN" demands including the reinstatement of Iran's freeze on uranium enrichment and greater co-operation with IAEA inspectors. Larijani's evident exasperation reflects a wider frustration in Tehran with Russia. One regime insider said on Feb 1 that he believed Iranian officials had misinformed Iran's leadership as to Russia's position in the run-up to Jan 31 P5 meeting.