White House dismisses Iranian president's 'offer'

WASHINGTON: The White House has scoffed at comments from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who has offered to suspend uranium enrichment work if Western countries do the same.   

"Do you believe that's a serious offer?" White House spokesman Tony Snow said when asked about Ahmadinejad's comments earlier Tuesday.   

The Iranian president said Tehran would refuse to meet a deadline Friday imposed by the UN Security Council to halt sensitive uranium enrichment efforts. But he told a rally in Rasht that Iran would be willing to stop the enrichment program if other nuclear powers were willing to do the same.   

Snow declined to comment on whether Iran might face additional sanctions if it failed to meet the UN deadline and said Washington was waiting for a report from the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed ElBaradei.   

"We'll see what the IAEA has to report," Snow said.   

The IAEA's ElBaradei is to report by Friday on whether Iran has stopped enrichment as required by the UN Security Council, and this finding will be reviewed at an IAEA board of governors meeting on March 6. The report could pave the way for tougher sanctions against Iran.   

Snow said the international community was not opposed to Iran having a civilian nuclear program to generate electricity. "We understand that Iran wants to have civilian nuclear power and we certainly have no problem with that," he said.

"What we do have a problem with is an Iran that has the ability to develop nuclear weapons."