Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad flew Thursday to neighboring Azerbaijan to seek regional support as Tehran reiterated its right to nuclear power. Ahmadinejad was meeting with leaders of Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Pakistan and Turkey on the sidelines of a ten-country economic forum, the Azeri presidential office told AFP.

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki also lashed out at Western pressure for tough UN action in response to his country's nuclear program.

"Member states of the NPT [nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty] should enjoy ... their right, which is peaceful nuclear technology. We are insisting on that," Mottaki told journalists in Azerbaijan's capital Baku.

The U.S. and its European allies allege that Iran is trying to acquire a nuclear bomb under cover of a civilian power network currently being built with Russian help.

A draft UN Security Council resolution sponsored by Britain and France would legally oblige Iran to comply with UN demands that it suspend enrichment of uranium or face possible sanctions.

Russia and China, which hold vetoes in the Council, have said they support action on Iran but want the resolution modified. They fear too much pressure would be self-defeating and precipitate an oil crisis.

French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said Thursday that military action was not the solution to the standoff.

Iran says it needs enriched uranium as fuel for its civilian nuclear program and refuses to halt the work.

Underlining the defiance Thursday, a deputy head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, Hossein Faghihian, announced a new breakthrough in the country's enrichment capability, according to Iranian media.

Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan would be urging Ahmadinejad to compromise when the two leaders met on the sidelines of the economic conference.

"All of us should make efforts for peace. We should insist on diplomatic means and find a compromise," he said on Turkish NTV television.

However, Mottaki was adamant, declaring that Iran was ready to discuss the standoff with experts from the UN monitoring body - the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) - but not in the UN Security Council.

Meanwhile, the Iranian military played down threats by a top Revolutionary Guards commander that Israel would be the Islamic state's first target if attacked by U.S. forces over its nuclear plans, a newspaper said on Thursday.

Alireza Afshar, deputy chief of military staff dismissed the remarks made Tuesday by Revolutionary Guards Rear Admiral Mohammad-Ebrahim Dehqani.

"What he said was his personal view and has no validity as far as the Iranian military officials are concerned," the Kayhan newspaper quoted Afshar as saying.

With no solution in sight to the standoff, the U.S. is coming under fresh pressure to engage in direct talks with the Islamic Republic and avoid an Iraq-like path to war.

The Bush administration has so far resisted, but a lack of viable alternatives may make negotiations more and more appealing. The U.S. military is already stretched in its war on terrorism, the international community is deeply suspicious of Washington's intentions, and Bush's popularity has been undercut by the war in Iraq.

At the same time, Iran's acceleration of its nuclear work, Washington's refusals to rule out force and the failure of European diplomacy have stoked international anxiety.

"It is now time for us to talk directly to Iran," Madeleine Albright, who was the U.S. secretary of state under President Bill Clinton, told Reuters Television this week.

"I do not see talking as appeasement and I think it would show our willingness to resolve an issue diplomatically - obviously with the support of the international community."

Many others - including Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA - also urge dialogue.

Iran feels encircled by U.S. forces and "one has to be blind and dumb not to see that all the pressure has united every faction in Iran, including reformers, behind the nuclear program," said a senior IAEA diplomat in Vienna who was not authorized to speak for the record.

"Where is the logic of not talking if the Americans can talk to North Korea," he said.