The International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly urged Iran to reconsider the Arak project, but Iran has kept on building and now wants IAEA technical expertise to ensure the plant meets safety standards.

Diplomats say the IAEA is unlikely to agree because of fears the Arak plant, which Iranian officials say is for peaceful purposes, could produce atomic explosives.

"Whether the IAEA helps or not, the research reactor in Arak will continue its work," the Iranian Student News Agency (ISNA) on Saturday quoted Gholamreza Aghazadeh, the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation, as saying.

"If the IAEA denies the assistance, it will be harmful for the IAEA...It is the IAEA that insists on Iran cooperating with it on the security dimension of the reactor."

Aghazadeh also said Arak, due for completion in 2009, would make isotopes for medical and other peaceful uses. He said it would replace a light water research reactor in Tehran, built by the United States before Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Western leaders say that, given Iran's record of hiding nuclear research from U.N. inspectors and evading IAEA probes, there is a high risk that it will produce plutonium, used in nuclear warheads, as a by-product of Arak's other output.

The United States is also seeking support for U.N. sanctions against Iran over its uranium enrichment program, which Washington fears could be used to build atomic bombs. Tehran says it only wants to produce electricity.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice pressed China's Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing on Saturday for quick action on a draft Security Council resolution imposing sanctions on Iran for its failure to halt the enrichment.

However, Rice's talks, at a summit meeting of Asia-Pacific leaders in Vietnam, appeared no closer to overcoming differences at the United Nations over the draft, drawn up by Britain, France and Germany and backed by Washington.

The draft resolution demands nations prevent the sale or supply of equipment, technology or financing that would contribute to Iran's nuclear or ballistic missile programs.

"The (Chinese) foreign minister really said that we all agree on the objectives. We all agree...this resolution is a sanctions resolution. The differences are how hard to push the Iranians right now," said a senior U.S. official in Hanoi.

"The secretary said yes, but now we have to get...a good strong resolution, in the near future," he said.

The United States has tried to reassure Russia and China, which both want amendments to the draft, that it is not seeking sweeping economic restrictions against Tehran.

The commander-in-chief of Iran's Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday imposing sanctions on Iran could result in the disruption of international oil flows through the strategic Gulf waterway, state television reported.

Yahya Rahim Safavi did not say how those flows would be affected but some Iranian officials have previously hinted Iran, the world's fourth largest oil exporter, could use oil as a weapon in its nuclear standoff.

The Revolutionary Guards, the ideological wing of Iran's military, recently held several sets of war games in and around the Gulf, which analysts interpreted as muscle-flexing and a veiled threat about Iran's ability to disrupt shipping if pushed. Reuters