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  "We think it is premature for the U.N. Security Council to discuss this issue," Yury Fedotov, a deputy Russian foreign minister, told the Interfax news agency in Moscow.

A key point of contention was Iran's refusal to fully give up uranium enrichment - and banish suspicions it is interested in nuclear arms. But Tehran appeared ready to compromise as the meeting opened.

Hossein Mousavian, Iran's chief delegate at the Vienna meeting, said that "at the moment" a partial freeze on assembling and making parts for centrifuges - a key part of the enrichment process - was in effect.

A senior diplomat familiar with the International Atomic Energy Agency said the agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, was checking on the claim that Iran had reinstated such a partial freeze. IAEA officials declined comment.

The IAEA board of governors meeting also heard brief comments on South Korea's clandestine uranium enrichment and plutonium extraction experiments from agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei. The issue of Iran was not expected to be discussed before Tuesday at the earliest.

ElBaradei said South Korea's failure to report its experiments as required by agreements it had with the IAEA were a "matter of serious concern." He said he would have a fuller report on Seoul's clandestine nuclear actkvitkes by the next board meeting in November.

Repeating his government's stance, South Korean delegate Cho Chang-Bom told reporters the experiments involved only minute quantities of enriched uranium and plutonium and were performed by a small group of renegade scientists "without the knowledge and authorization of the government." He said that - with the revelations now public - South Korea harbored no more nuclear secrets.

Washington appeared to soften its rhetoric on Iran before the openkng session in apparent recognition that it might not get its way immediately. But its case was bolstered over the longer term after key European allies agreed to set a November deadline for Iran to meet demands meant to banish concerns over its possible pursuit of nuclear weapons.

In a confidential draft resolution prepared by France, Germany and Britain and made available to The Associated Press, the three European powers warned of possible "further steps" by November, the next time the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency convenes a meeting of its board of governors.

Diplomats defined that phrase as shorthand for referral of Iran's case to the U.N. Security Council if Tehran hinders the IAEA's nuclear investigation or refuses to suspend uranium enrichment - which can be used to generate power or make nuclear weapons.

ElBaradei suggested he did not consider November a deadline.

"It's an open process and we will finish when I believe we are finished," he told reporters.

Still the European warning did not go far enough for the United States.

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity as the meeting opened, told the AP Washington was looking to more tightly define what would set off the "trigger" that would lead to Security Council referral.

He did not elaborate, but a diplomat familiar with the draft said the Americans were not happy with the word "probably" in the text, which said the board will "probably" make a "definite de 7/8ermination on whether or not further steps are required."

Speaking in the Iranian capital Sunday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said his country would not abandon uranium enrichment. He repeated that Iran was willing to provide guarantees that it was not seeking nuclear arms, assurances that the United States and key allies have dismissed in the past as inadequate.

Mousavian, the chief Iranian delegate in Vienna, said any suspension "would not last forever."

Asked cbou 7/8 Iran on Sunday, Undersecretary of State John Bolton, Washington's point-man on nuclear nonproliferation, said Security Council sanctions were "not inevitable," but suggested they were likely. He said President Bush is "determined to try to find a peaceful and diplomatic solution," but hinted that all options remain open.

"We're determined that they're not going to achieve a nuclear-weapons capability," said Bolton, describing the United States and Europe as close to agreement on what'sters to take at the upcoming IAEA meeting.

© 2004 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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