Western powers will probably ratchet up sanctions against Iran but that will not be enough to resolve a standoff over its nuclear ambitions, International Atomic Energy Agency head Mohamed ElBaradei said on Monday.

"The Iran issue is not going to be resolved through sanctions alone. You need to reach out to the country and bring them to engagement. You need to get that process going," ElBaradei told a conference in London on Monday.

ElBaradei said there is still time to negotiate with Iran about its nuclear program, saying it would take years for Tehran to produce weapons.

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He also said international cooperation and more aid for poor countries are needed to build a secure world free of nuclear weapons.

"Our system is based on a combination of inequality and insecurity," ElBaradei said in a speech at the London School of Economics.

This week, Iran faces a U.N. Security Council deadline to halt uranium enrichment or face further economic sanctions.

ElBaradei, general director of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, said he hopes Iran can be persuaded to end its nuclear program.

He said Iran is not an imminent danger and that it would be "four to six years before the country could develop nuclear weapons - which means that you have enough time to engage in dialogue."

Russia to delay construction of Iranian nuclear reactor
Russia will delay construction work at Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactor because Iran is behind with its payments, a source in Russia's nuclear agency said on Monday.

The source in Rosatom told Reuters it was "obvious that the timetable on building the plant will need to be corrected" because Tehran had not made payments for the work for more than a month.

A top nuclear official in Iran on Monday rejected Raussian claims of foot-dragging on payments for the nuclear power plant and accused Moscow of trying to prolong the reactor's launch, the official news agency reported.

"Iran has had no delay whatsoever in making payments for the Bushehr nuclear power plant to the Russian ... company," IRNA quoted Mohammad Saeedi, deputy head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, as saying.

Russia has been building Iran's first nuclear plant, known as Bushehr, since the early 1990s. It has delayed work several times, citing technical reasons, as the project has become politically sensitive since Iran came under Western pressure over its nuclear ambitions.

Moscow is due to start nuclear fuel deliveries for the plant in March this year, paving the way for the reactor's planned start-up in September.

It was unclear by how long the project would now be delayed.

The United States, which suspects Iran of trying to obtain nuclear weapons, wants Russia to stop building the Bushehr nuclear plant altogether.

Iran and Russia say the power plant is meant solely to produce electricity.