"We are never going to negotiate the nuclear fuel cycle, which we were able to obtain through the efforts of our country's scientists," Oil Minister Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh told Telesur late Wednesday.

The Iranian minister downplayed a US offer to join direct talks with Iran if Tehran halts uranium enrichment activities. Kazem called Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's announcement, which marks a major US policy shift, "words that US officials always repeat."

"To underscore our commitment to a diplomatic solution and to enhance the prospects for success, as soon as Iran fully and verifiably suspends its enrichment and reprocessing activities, the United States will come to the table with our EU colleagues and meet with Iran's representatives," Rice said in Washington on Wednesday.

Vaziri-Hamaneh said reports by international inspectors that Iran's nuclear program shows no sign of being diverted for military applications are the "best guarantee" of the peaceful nature of the program.

Soaring oil prices were due to the "constant threats of the United States" against Iran, he said.

Talking to reporters on the sidelines of Thursday's OPEC meeting, Vaziri-Hamaneh said Tehran does not use its abundant oil reserves as a political weapon.

"We never use oil as a political tool, as shown by our commitments to supply crude oil to the world market. We never wanted to deprive the world from our crude oil" (even during previous wars), the oil minister said.

Ministers of the 11-nation Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries meet in the Venezuelan capital Thursday, a day after the United States issued its historic offer to hold direct talks with Iran over Tehran's nuclear plans.

The offer took the sting out of oil prices, with markets already reassured about OPEC's intentions to keep output levels steady.

The oil market has been convulsed for weeks by the threat of UN sanctions against Iran, which after Saudi Arabia is the second-biggest oil exporter in OPEC.

However, Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki has already rejected the condition placed by the United States, saying, "we will not talk about our undeniable and legitimate rights, because this is the right of our people according to international laws and treaties."

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