"Iran will today resume nuclear fuel research as scheduled," government spokesman Gholamhossein Elham told a news conference yesterday morning. Germany, France and Britain have been trying for over two years to persuade Iran to abandon its uranium enrichment program, which could be used to make atom bomb fuel. The EU and the United States suspect Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons, a charge Iran strongly denies. EU and U.S. officials have said a resumption of research could lead to Tehran being referred to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told reporters an Iranian resumption of research "cannot be left without consequences. We will discuss it with our colleagues from France and Great Britain ... by Thursday at the latest." "It would be a breach of the agreements we reached in Paris ... " he said, referring to the November 2004 accord in which Iran agreed to freeze its enrichment program while in talks with the EU trio. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei added to the pressure on Iran to hold its hand. "I am running out of patience, the international community is running out of patience, the credibility of the verification process is at stake and I'd like, come March, which is my next report, to be able to clarify these issues," he told Sky Television in an interview. "Everybody would like to see us clarifying the remaining issues, everybody would like to see a regime by which the international community is assured that the Iranian program is exclusively for peaceful purposes and there are still a number of issues we are looking at," he said. Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik, whose country holds the EU presidency, said Iran's decision was "the wrong step in the wrong direction and is a cause of very serious concern." Iran insists its nuclear ambitions are entirely peaceful and says it has the right to enrich uranium on its own soil. The IAEA said two letters sent by Iran to explain its move left key questions unresolved and the Vienna-based agency said it had asked for more information. If Iran complies with the IAEA requests, the restart of nuclear work could be delayed. Iran has not publicly disclosed what activities it plans to resume. Diplomats and analysts say atomic research and development (R&D) could involve some laboratory tests of uranium enrichment and assembly of centrifuge enrichment machines. PIN/REUTERS