Iran agrees on nuclear inspections, uranium freeze

Iran agreed yesterday to snap inspections of its nuclear sites and to freeze uranium enrichment in what three visiting European ministers hailed as a promising start to removing doubts about Tehran's atomic aims.

But a senior Iranian official said Tehran would only halt uranium enrichment - seen by Washington as the heart of a possible bid for nuclear arms - for as long as it saw fit, prompting some analysts to suggest Iran was playing for time.

British, French and German foreign ministers, who flew to Tehran with a carrot-and-stick deal aimed at convincing Iran to comply with an October 31 UN deadline to prove it has no atomic bomb ambitions, greeted the agreement as an important step forward rather than a breakthrough.

"It's been an important day's work but you can only judge its significance in time and through implementation," British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw told reporters just before leaving the country after a series talks with Iranian officials.

The United States said agreement to freeze uranium enrichment could be a positive step if fully carried out.

"Full compliance will now be essential," White House spokesman Scott McClellan, who is with US President George W. Bush on an Asian tour, told reporters in Singapore.

He said Iran should cooperate fully with the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and end uranium enrichment and reprocessing. IAEA spokesman Mark Gwozdecky said the result of the talks was "encouraging" but said Iran had still to provide the UN with a full declaration of its past nuclear activities.

By offering economic and technological benefits in return for nuclear compliance, the big three European powers made their move outside the framework of the European Union as a whole and struck a different approach to Washington, which generally opposes offering Tehran's clerical rulers any rewards for cooperation.