Britain, U.S. confident of new sanctions on Iran

By Sue Pleming

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said on Tuesday he was confident China and Russia would support a third round of U.N. sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program.

Miliband, in Washington to meet U.S. officials and lawmakers, dismissed suggestions that Russia and China, which hold veto power in the U.N. Security Council, would not back more sanctions against Tehran for refusing to give up its sensitive nuclear work.

"I don't accept that we don't know what the next step is and that the international community will somehow fragment," Miliband told reporters at the British Embassy in Washington.

Miliband, who discussed Iran during talks on Monday withSecretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said China and Russia made clear in New York last month that if Iran did not give up uranium enrichment work then a third U.N. Security Council resolution would be drawn up.

"It was not just us who signed up to that but the Chinese and the Russians signed up to that too," he said.

He said sanctions were working against Tehran, pointing to a drop of 34 percent in European investment in Iran up until May of this year.

"Clearly we have not yet succeeded in our goals in respect to uranium enrichment ... and that is why a further sanctions resolution is being contemplated," Miliband said.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday that Tehran would not retreat "one iota" from its nuclear program. His new nuclear negotiator was set to meet European Union negotiator Javier Solana in Rome on Tuesday.