Iran still considering N-offer: Ahmadinejad

The Iranian President says a reply on the nuclear offer will not be given before mid-August.

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Thursday that Tehran was still considering international demands to freeze sensitive nuclear work in exchange for incentives, but said a reply would not be given before mid-August.

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"We will try to conduct a positive examination (of the offer) and will give our reply at the end of Mordad," or the Iranian month that ends on August 22, he was quoted as saying by state television.

"We want to solve the problem calmly," he said, the day after world powers decided to send Iran back to the Un Security Council for failing to halt its uranium enrichment programme.

Iran says it only wants to enrich to make civilian reactor fuel, but the process can be extended to make weapons.

But Ahmadinejad also repeated that "we will not renounce our absolute right to use peaceful nuclear technology" -- in yet another signal the country was unlikely to return to a freeze of enrichment.