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US President George W. Bush pledged Thursday to work with allies to strengthen sanctions on Iran after a UN watchdog agency reported that Teheran was accelerating its nuclear enrichment program in defiance of international demands.

"The world has spoken and said... no nuclear weapons programs. And yet they're constantly ignoring the demands," Bush said at a White House news conference. The ratcheting up of rhetoric against Iran came just days before US and Iranian diplomats were to meet in Baghdad to discuss ways of stabilizing Iraq.

The president said he had directed Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to work with European partners to "develop further sanctions." He said he would also soon discuss the matter with Russia and China.

Iran's leaders "continue to be defiant as to the demands of the free world," Bush said. "My view is that we need to strengthen our sanction regime."

The UN's nuclear watchdog agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), on Wednesday accused Iran of accelerating its uranium enrichment program despite international demands that it shut it down. The US has moved two aircraft carriers and seven other ships into the Persian Gulf in a show of force.

The United States has lodged a formal protest with the head of the UN nuclear watchdog agency for suggesting that Iran be allowed to keep some elements of its uranium enrichment program, and France and Britain plan to do the same, diplomats said Thursday.

The diplomats said Gregory L. Schulte, the chief US representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), had expressed his displeasure in a meeting on Wednesday with IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei. His British and French counterparts would follow suit as early as today, said the diplomats, who demanded anonymity because their information was confidential.

"They have an appointment with ElBaradei tomorrow," said one of the diplomats, alluding to the heads of the British and French missions to the IAEA.

IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming confirmed that Schulte and ElBaradei had met on Wednesday but she declined to elaborate beyond saying the mood was "cordial."

Diplomats first revealed such plans on Tuesday, saying the US was seeking allied support for a protest. Thursday, they said Washington had enlisted the French and British. Canada, Australia and several other countries normally backing Washington on Iran had not made a decision as of Thursday on whether to back the move, they said.

The Americans and their allies are taking issue with recent public suggestions by ElBaradei that it is too late to force Teheran to scrap its enrichment program as demanded by the UN Security Council and his push instead for implementing inspection safeguards to prevent an expansion of the program.

"I believe that (UN) demand has been superseded by events," ElBaradei told the Spanish newspaper ABC last week. Instead, he said, "the important thing now is to concentrate on Iran not taking it to industrial scale."

France had already publicly rebuffed ElBaradei on Wednesday. French Foreign Ministry spokesman Jean-Baptiste Mattei said Paris shared "the gist of concerns expressed by our American partners - along with several other partners, for that matter," adding: "I can confirm that our permanent representative in Vienna will take part in the American initiative."

(China Daily via agencies May 25, 2007)