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Letter to the editor

Iran warns against Western sanctions

Its leader says nuclear program won't stop.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published June 6, 2007

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's nuclear program cannot be stopped, and any Western attempt to force a halt to uranium enrichment would be like playing "with the lion's tail, " President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday.

In Berlin, Germany's foreign minister reported no progress in talks with Iran's chief nuclear negotiator ahead of the Group of Eight summit. And with the U.N. Security Council preparing to debate a third set of sanctions for Tehran's refusal to suspend enrichment, Britain raised the possibility of adding curbs on oil and gas investment to the limited measures against individuals and companies involved in Iran's nuclear and weapons programs.

"We advise them to give up stubbornness and childish games, " Ahmadinejad said at a news conference.

"Some say Iran is like a lion. It's seated quietly in a corner. We advise them not to play with the lion's tail."

Added Ahmadinejad: "It is too late to stop the progress of Iran."

In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack responded: "It isn't."

"He could make the decision today to take up the reasonable offer to negotiate with the rest of the world, " McCormack said.

Adding to the tensions, shortly after Ahmadinejad's news conference, Tehran issued its harshest refusal yet of American demands to release dual citizens held in Iran on espionage charges.

The Foreign Ministry said U.S. abuses - from prisoner mistreatment at Guantanamo to a UCLA police officer's shocking an Iranian-American student with a Taser - showed that Washington had no right to criticize Iran's human rights record.

[Last modified June 6, 2007, 00:55:04]