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Putin clings to Iran assets
22/06/2003 15:01 - (SA)
London - Russia will not let concerns about Iran's nuclear programme be used as an excuse for squeezing Russian companies out of the country, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in an interview broadcast on Sunday.
"We are against the option of using the subject of Iran's potential nuclear programme as a way of squeezing Russian companies out of the Iranian market," Putin told BBC television.
Russia would continue to develop links with Tehran despite harbouring "some serious questions" about Iran's nuclear programme, he said.
"Iran is our neighbour and traditional partner and we have developed a certain system of international co-operation," he told the Breakfast with Frost programme from Moscow.
"We plan to develop relations," he continued, pointing out that "certain western European countries" were also reportedly cooperating with Iran's nuclear programme.
But he stressed: "We are against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction".
The interview was recorded on Friday, four days before Putin is due to arrive in Britain for the first state visit by a Russian leader since Tsar Alexander II's trip in 1874.
Nuclear reactor
Russia has drawn United States ire for helping Iran build its first nuclear reactor and for insisting that the oil-rich country is not seeking to develop a nuclear weapons programme.
Iran has repeatedly rejected international demands to immediately allow tougher inspections of its nuclear projects by the UN's International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA).
In a concession to US concerns, Russia has said it will deliver nuclear fuel to the nuclear plant at Bushehr only after Iran agrees to let the IAEA inspect all suspected nuclear sites, not just those it has declared to the international watchdog.
Putin said Iranian President Mohammad Khatami had recently confirmed to him that the Islamic republic would sign up to a deal that "would put its nuclear programme under full control of the IAEA".
On his visit to London, from Tuesday to Friday, Putin is expected to try and mend fences over the US-British war on Iraq, which Russia opposed.
Despite the disagreements, Putin sounded an optimistic note ahead of the visit, during which he and his wife Lyudmila will stay as guests of Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace in London.
"We think it reflects the new quality of relations between Russia and Britain," he said of the trip.
Putin has been to the country twice before as president but never amid all the pomp that marks an official state visit.
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