Mottaki said that the Russian proposal should be negotiated to "help clarify some of its aspects and study more elements," adding that Iran welcomed any initiative or effort for securing the country's legal rights while dispersing the international concerns over its nuclear program.

Noting Moscow's recent call for Iran's re-suspension of uranium enrichment work, Mottaki stressed that Iran would never accept any preconditions for talks.

Russia proposed last December that the two countries establish a joint venture in Russia to enrich uranium for Iran. Tehran termed the offer as incomplete but not negative, expressing determination to enrich uranium on the Iranian soil.

An Iranian delegation will leave for Moscow later on Sunday to discuss the compromise proposal with Russian officials. Meanwhile, Mottaki will head for Brussels, Belgium, to hold talks with European diplomats over the rising nuclear tension.

The European Union (EU), broker of the Iranian nuclear issue for more than two years, has expressed willingness to accept the Russian proposal.

The nuclear negotiations between Iran and the EU were paralyzed after Tehran defiantly resumed nuclear research work on Jan. 10 and sent ambiguous messages on the Russian proposal.

The tension further escalated as Iran recently resumed small-scale uranium enrichment and prohibited the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) snap inspections, a retaliative move against the UN nuclear watchdog's decision on Feb. 4 to report Iran's nuclear case to the UN Security Council.

Uranium enrichment is the key step for constructing nuclear fuel cycle, but highly enriched uranium can be used for building nuclear weapons.

The United States accuses Iran of secretly developing nuclear weapons, and the European Union also holds that Iran's full mastery of nuclear fuel cycle technology would possibly lead to military usage.

Iran, however, rejects the allegation as politically motivated, insisting that its nuclear program is fully peaceful and aimed at meeting rising domestic demand for electricity.

There was no word on the outcome of closed-door Kremlin talks between Russian and Iranian officials on Moscow's offer to enrich uranium on Iran's behalf for use in power stations. A Russian source said the two sides would meet again on Tuesday.

"It is too early to talk about results. The negotiations are continuing," Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said.

The United States and the European Union trio of France, Britain and Germany -- the countries pressing Iran hardest on its nuclear program -- have welcomed the Russian plan.

But U.S. and other officials are skeptical, saying Tehran is keeping the Russian offer on the table to buy time.

"The Iranians will try to throw sand in everybody's eyes, as they have for the last three years," the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, said of the Moscow talks. "We'll see what results," he told reporters in New York.

In Brussels, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki insisted his country would press ahead with nuclear research even if it accepts the Russian proposal.

"If we reach some compromise ... (on the Russian proposal), we continue our cooperation from where we are now. That is, the research department will continue its activity," he said.

Iran says it needs atomic power for electricity, not bombs.

European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said Mottaki had made no new proposals to EU officials.

"The substantive position (of Iran) has not changed," he told reporters, urging Tehran to shift its stance before Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), reports on Iran's nuclear activities on March 6.

Iranians point out that nuclear energy makes profound economic sense for their nation. The nuclear energy program aims to use the nation's own uranium resources.

More important, nuclear energy development would allow Iran to husband its natural gas resources that are currently being exhausted for electricity generation, but that could much more profitably be exported to growing industrial markets such as China and India.

And, don't you know it, the self-interest of the United States plays a role too. Not now, of course, but historically:

Indeed, the United States supported Iran's switching over to nuclear energy under our ally Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi in good part so that Iran's oil and natural gas would be preserved.

Iranians, annoyed that that history is being ignored, correctly note that "nuclear technology transfer" was encouraged by both American government and American industry in the 1970s. President Gerald Ford offered Iran a full nuclear fuel cycle in 1976, and American nuclear plant manufacturers touted their wares at exhibitions and trade fares in Tehran.

Although it isn't as much of a mystery to anyone who understands the concepts of "national sovereignty," the article also sheds light on why Iran would not be amenable to allowing nuclear enrichment programs to be based in another country (Russia):

One of the reasons for this failure was the flawed partnership between the shah's government and the West. European and American industry was happy to cooperate with Iran in industrialization schemes, but these programs never provided Iran with the capacity for basic manufacturing [Ed. note: this is of course, no accident, but the essence of imperialism]. Industrial operations were largely turnkey assembly facilities designed to supply goods for internal Iranian consumption, with no possibility for export.

For this reason, Tehran's leaders began working with the Soviet Union and Japan in the 1970s to develop the basic industries they felt Iran needed to be a successful state. They developed a steel mill with the Soviet Union in Isfahan at enormous public cost and a petroleum refinery with Mitsui.

That history helps explain why Tehran is resisting a plan, suggested by Britain, Germany and France, that would allow Iran to have nuclear plants if Russia conducts the process to provide the enriched uranium to run the reactors and then repossesses the spent fuel rods.

That would alleviate outside fears that Iran would misuse its energy program to create nuclear weapons, but it smacks of the neo-colonial "assembly industry" so despised by the revolutionary forces in 1978-79.

The report appeared Monday in Israel's Jerusalem Post newspaper, which cited an anonymous source in the Georgian government as saying that Georgia, to the northwest of Iran, could give the U.S. access to its airbases and other facilities if it decided to press ahead with action.

According to the paper, the country could agree to such a scenario despite the threat of retaliatory action from Iran, which recently agreed to supply the South Caucasus republic with natural gas, unrest among Georgia's Muslim minority and a further deterioration in relations with Russia.

Georgia has already accepted considerable U.S. military aid and President Mikheil Saakashvili is known for his Western views and desire to take the country into NATO.

Rumors that the U.S. was holding talks with Georgia and Azerbaijan on establishing a military alliance appeared in late 2004 but were immediately scotched by Tbilisi and Baku, Jerusalem Post said.

The Jerusalem Post report came against the backdrop of an escalating crisis around Iran's controversial nuclear programs. Although Tehran has consistently said that it only wants to develop nuclear power for peaceful purposes, the United States, Israel and members of the European Union have accused it of pursuing a covert weapons program. Washington has suggested that military action to end Iran's nuclear ambitions has not been ruled out, as both President George Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld have said Iran must be prevented from developing nuclear weapons.