MOSCOW – Russia said on Friday Iran must cooperate more actively with the UN nuclear agency to convince the world its nuclear program is peaceful, and gave fresh signals the Kremlin may back sanctions. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) suggested for the first time that Iran was actively pursuing a nuclear weapons capability now, rather than merely having done so in the past. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday repeated Iran's insistence that suspicions about its nuclear program were baseless. But the US-led campaign for more sanctions against Tehran appeared to be gaining ground. "Tehran must be more active in its cooperation with the IAEA and widen it," Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko was quoted as saying at a briefing in Moscow. The comments reinforced indications that Moscow's patience with Tehran is wearing thin, as the United States leads a push for the U.N. Security Council to impose a fourth round of sanctions. Russia hinted that talks on a resolution could start soon. "No work is in progress at the UN Security Council in New York today to prepare a possible sanctions-based resolution on Iran. However, given the current circumstances, we cannot fully rule out the possibility of starting this work," Interfax quoted Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko as saying.
