Iran's president cancels U.N. appearance

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad canceled a trip to New York to address the U.N. Security Council before it votes on whether to impose further sanctions against his country for refusing to stop enriching uranium, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said Friday.

The decision came as diplomats from the five veto-wielding members of the Security Council _ the U.S., Britain, France, China and Russia _ and Germany held a flurry of last-minute negotiations in New York on a draft resolution seeking to pressure Iran to comply.

The six powers want a vote on the resolution by Saturday, but diplomats said that could be delayed by efforts to reach consensus to give the sanctions more weight.

The sanctions, agreed on last week by the six powers, would ban Iranian arms exports and freeze the assets of 28 additional individuals and organizations involved in Iran's nuclear and missile programs. About a third of those are linked to the Revolutionary Guard, an elite military corps.

Ahmadinejad said earlier this month that he wanted to take his case for pursuing nuclear power to the Security Council himself. Earlier Friday, a council diplomat said the Iranian president would arrive in New York at 1 a.m. Saturday, just hours before the council is expected to meet.

But Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Ali Hosseini told Iranian state television later in the day that the trip had been scrapped because of "America's obstruction in issuing visas" to the Iranian delegation that was to travel to New York.

Hosseini said that instead of Ahmadinejad, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki will attend the Security Council meeting and "explain Iran's position regarding its nuclear activities."

"Due to open failure by the United States to issue visas for members of the Iranian delegation accompanying President Ahmadinejad and the air crew, American authorities have effectively prevented President Ahmadinejad from attending the U.N. security council meeting," Hosseini said.

Mohammad Mir Ali Mohammadi, press secretary of Iran's mission at the U.N., told The Associated Press that the U.S. did not deliver a visa to the U.S. Embassy in Bern, Switzerland, in time for Ahmadinejad to pick it up before flying to New York for the Saturday session.

He said Russia and China were trying to postpone the session until Monday and if the session was put off Ahamdinejad would decide whether to come.

Tom Casey, a State Department spokesman, said in Washington that 39 visas had been issued for Ahmadinejad and other Iranian officials and their passports had been returned to Iranian diplomats in Bern by Friday morning. He said another 36 passports with visas were ready later in the day.

The U.S. says Iran's nuclear efforts are cover for a weapons program, but Tehran insists it only wants electricity.

In December, the Security Council voted unanimously to impose limited sanctions on Iran, ordering all countries to stop supplying Iran with materials and technology that could contribute to its nuclear and missile programs and to freeze assets of 10 key Iranian companies and 12 individuals related to those programs. Iran responded by expanding its enrichment program.

Several non-permanent members of the Security Council have resisted the draft resolution, agreed upon last week by the five council powers and Germany.

In an effort to overcome their concerns, Russia proposed a compromise Friday over a proposal by Indonesia and Qatar calling for the Middle East to be free of weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. Including such an appeal could have implications for Israel, a U.S. ally widely believed to possess nuclear weapons, though it has never officially acknowledged it.

The Russian proposal would include a recognition that "a solution to the Iranian nuclear issue would contribute global non-proliferation efforts, including those in the Middle East."

France and Britain approved of the wording, while the United States was considering it, said Axel Crau, a spokesman for France's U.N. mission.

"It's definitely a key point and probably the key to unanimity," Crau said.

He said the resolution's co-sponsors _ France, Germany and Britain _ still wanted to call a vote Saturday but may delay it to seek consensus. "For the sake of unanimity we are willing to make some efforts because unanimity has a value," he said.

Alejandro Wolff, the acting U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, said the nuclear debate should not be affected by the Iranian seizure of 15 British sailors and marines in the Persian Gulf Friday.