PHUKET (Thailand), July 22 (RIA Novosti) - The United States warned Iran on Wednesday that it would take "crippling action" if it continued its nuclear weapons program.
"We will still hold the door open but we also have made it clear that we'll take actions, as I've said time and time again, crippling action, working to upgrade the defense of our partners in the region," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.
Speaking in Thailand, where she attended the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Clinton said crossing the nuclear threshold would not make Iran safer.
"We want Iran to calculate... that if the U.S. extends a defense umbrella over the region, if we do even more to support the military capacity of those in the Gulf, it's unlikely that Iran will be any stronger or safer because they won't be able to intimidate and dominate as they apparently believe they can once they have a nuclear weapon."
However, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov urged patience and said Iran was preparing a response to the proposals from a group of international mediators.
The group (Germany, China, the United States, France, Britain and Russia) urged Iran to return to the negotiating table and organize a high-level meeting to discuss its nuclear program.
Western powers suspect Iran of trying to build a nuclear weapon, while Iran says it needs the program for peaceful power generation.
Experts believe that Iran has the capacity to build a nuclear bomb and conduct a nuclear test similar to North Korea's in the near future.
Tehran announced in late February that it had 6,000 operating centrifuges at its Natanz uranium enrichment facility and was planning to install a total of 50,000 over the next five years.
