Senior cleric says Iran will not be intimidated

TEHRAN, June 2 (Reuters) Iran will not be intimidated into giving up its nuclear fuel work by growing Western pressure, an influential cleric today said.

''The Iranian nation is ready to pay any price to protect its right (to nuclear technology),'' Ahmad Khatami told worshippers today at Prayers in Tehran.

He was speaking a day after major world powers agreed in Vienna on a proposal combining incentives for Iran to halt work that could produce nuclear weapons with the threat of U N Security Council action if it refuses.

There has been no official reaction so far from Iran.

But Khatami, in the first public response by a senior Iranian figure, said Iran had no fear of sanctions or military attack.

''You threaten us with the consequences ... If it is imposing economic sanctions ... We have obtained our nuclear programme under sanctions,'' he said.

''We have been militarily attacked by major powers during the (1980-1988) Iran-Iraq war,'' added Khatami, who is a member of the Assembly of Experts, a clerical body that supervises Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

REUTERS DKS DS1630