US: Iran dispute will be taken up by Sec. Council

Unless Iran executes a dramatic about-face and suspends all its nuclear activities, the UN Security Council will intervene "quite actively," a senior State Department official said Monday. The message to Iran is that it has "crossed the international red line" and engaged in unacceptable enrichment activity "and there must be a UN Security Council process to deal with that," Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said. Burns did not say what the United States would ask the Security Council to do. While the Bush administration takes a stern line toward Tehran it might not be able to persuade other nations to impose economic or other penalties on Iran.