DAR AL HARB - U.K.: REVIVE THE NON-PROLIFERATION TREATY IS CHANCELLOR GORDON BROWN'S "NEW IDEA" ON HOW TO SOLVE THE NUCLEAR ISSUE WITH IRAN

Brown may try to revive nuclear pact to curb Iran
By Sophie Walker - Analysis

LONDON (Reuters) - Chancellor Gordon Brown may lead efforts to revive the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as a way of tackling Iran's atomic ambitions, his most pressing foreign policy challenge once he becomes prime minister.

Government and diplomatic sources say he may have less than a year to influence policy on Iran as Washington's patience with Tehran wears thin.

Western relations with Iran are fraught because of concern it may be trying to build nuclear bombs under cover of an atomic energy programme, and threats of U.N. sanctions appear so far to have done nothing to dissuade it from pressing on.

"There are things Brown can do and things he can't do. Iran is the thing he can't not do," said one government source.

Experts believe Iran is close to enriching industrial quantities of uranium, which can be used to generate electricity or, if highly enriched, to make nuclear bombs.

Sources close to Brown say his aides are discussing ways of reinforcing the NPT, a pact which has neither prevented several states acquiring nuclear arms nor persuaded others to disarm.

"We need to think about whether we want to take a more internationalist approach to the counter-proliferation agenda and look at steps that could be taken by nuclear-possessing countries to get the process going again," said one source.

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