Rice: 'There will be consequences' for Iran

iranmania: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the United Nations must take action against Iran's nuclear programme and highlighted part of the UN charter that allows sanctions to escalate into military action, AFP reported.

Rice said that faced with Iran's repeated refusal to halt activities that Washington suspects hides work towards making a nuclear bomb, the United States "will look at the full range of options available to the United Nations".

"There is no doubt that Iran continues to defy the will of the international community," Rice said, speaking after Iran's hardline regime dismissed appeals from the UN atomic watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei to freeze its controversial research.

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was in Tehran to appeal for an end to uranium enrichment that is a major step in any bomb programme.

Hardline Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad vowed there was "no room for defeat and retreat" over the nuclear work he insists is peaceful.

But Rice declared: "When the Security Council reconvenes, there will have to be some consequence for that action."

She suggested chapter seven of the UN Charter which sets out specific action that can be taken when there is a threat to international peace or an act of aggression.

"One thing the Security Council has, and the IAEA does not have, is the ability to compel, through chapter seven resolutions, member states of the UN to obey the will of the international system," Rice said.

"And I'm certain that we'll look at measures that could be taken to ensure that Iran knows that they really have no choice but to comply." Read more