Russia may back Iran sanctions

MOSCOW — President Dmitri Medvedev said Russia might back sanctions against Iran if the Iranians did not take a "constructive position" on an international plan to temporarily diminish their stockpile of enriched uranium.

The statement, made in an interview with German news magazine Der Spiegel and released by the Kremlin, resembles one Medvedev made in September after meeting with President Obama in New York.

But it takes on added significance now because Iran has equivocated on the international agreement. That deal would require Iran to ship its low-enriched uranium out of the country for processing, easing fears that the fuel would be used for nuclear bombs.

"If agreements are reached on the programs linked to uranium enrichment and its use for peaceful purposes in Iran, we will with pleasure take part in these programs," Medvedev said. "If the Iranian leadership takes a less constructive position, then anything is possible, in theory.

"We would not want this to end in imposing sanctions under international law, because sanctions, as a rule, are a complex and dangerous path," he continued. "But if there is no forward movement, no one can rule out this scenario."

Russia has traditionally opposed sanctions against Iran, which it considers an important regional ally.

In September, Medvedev signaled a policy shift after meeting with Obama, but Moscow remained reluctant; as recently as last month, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called sanctions "counterproductive." Still, Moscow may be left with no choice if Iran rejects the uranium-enrichment plan, which Russia helped draft under the auspices of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

News of the accord — supported by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — led to a political uproar in Iran, where his critics said the country was giving up too much to the West.

The government then began to back away, saying it would not abide by the original terms, but it had alternative proposals.

On Saturday, a senior Iranian lawmaker kept up the pressure on the government to reject the deal. The lawmaker, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, told the semiofficial news agency ISNA that the deal was "called off," although he also said that Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, was "in talks" to try to find options to the deal.

Boroujerdi rejected the notion that there was a deadline for responding to the deal.

Under the original plan, the country would have been required to send about three-quarters of its known stockpile of low-enriched uranium to Russia for conversion into a form it could use only in a nuclear reactor to produce energy.

Medvedev's latest comments on sanctions came just ahead of a visit to Germany for Monday's anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Among the topics he discussed was the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty; he said that Washington, D.C., and Moscow "have every chance" to complete a renegotiation "and sign a legally binding document by the end of this year."

Robert F. Worth contributed reporting from Beirut, Lebanon.