TEHRAN, 16 September 2004 — Iran’s powerful former president, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, vowed yesterday the Islamic republic would resist international efforts to prevent it from mastering advanced nuclear technology.

“The Europeans and the Americans say with determination that Iran must not master nuclear technology and we respond with determination that we reply with determination that we will not renounce our legitimate right,” he was quoted as saying by the student news agency ISNA.

He was criticizing a draft resolution put before the International Atomic Energy Agency by the Europeans which calls on Iran to ease suspicions over it nuclear drive by November and suspend fuel cycle activities.

“The United States and Europe say the same things, and there will be a lot of problems in the future,” he said.

The US is pushing the UN nuclear watchdog to adopt a resolution in Vienna this week that would set a deadline, possibly as early as Oct. 31, for Tehran to fully suspend uranium enrichment and take other measures.

Tehran insists its program is strictly for civilian purposes and within the confines of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). But Washington accuses it of failing to live up to a year-old agreement to suspend the building of centrifuges used for enriching uranium and of covering up a clandestine weapons program.

Meanwhile, European negotiators moved closer to a deal on a resolution on Iran’s nuclear program that could trigger a November showdown, Western diplomats close to the talks said in Vienna.

European and US diplomats haggled over the wording of the latest draft, obtained by Reuters, that would set an Oct. 31 deadline for Iran to eliminate fears it has a covert atom bomb program.

The diplomats were meeting in backroom talks during a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has been probing Iran’s nuclear program for two years.

“We’re closer to a deal, but we’re waiting to see what the EU reaction is to latest proposals by the US, Australia and Canada,” said a Western diplomat close to the negotiations.

The most contentious of these proposals is a demand for an “automatic trigger” in the wording of the draft that would lead to Iran being reported to the UN Security Council and possible economic sanctions if it does not halt its uranium enrichment program by Oct. 31. France, Britain and Germany object to this. “The EU three are okay with the demand to suspend enrichment, but they don’t want it included in the trigger. And they want to soften the trigger so it’s not automatic,” a diplomat on the IAEA’s 35-nation board of governors said.

Hossein Mousavian, head of Iran’s delegation to the IAEA meeting, said Iran planned to resume enrichment soon, but did not reject the possibility it could extend the suspension beyond the one-year mark in November for “one or two months”.

“We have done everything to build confidence, but if the Europeans want us to do something else we can discuss it,” he said.

Although the IAEA has uncovered undeclared nuclear activities in Iran, it has found nothing to prove the US allegations.

European diplomats believe the demand to report Iran to the Security Council immediately would be counterproductive. But if Tehran goes ahead with its plans to enrich uranium, the EU trio would accept the idea of reporting Iran when the IAEA meets in November, diplomats say.