French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner has said that his country had to prepare for the possibility of war against Iran over its nuclear programme, but he did not believe any such action was imminent. Speaking in an interview on RTL radio and LCI television, Kouchner said the world?s biggest powers should use further sanctions to show they were serious about stopping Tehran getting atom bombs before it came to war. ?We must prepare for the worst,? Kouchner said, adding: ?The worst, sir, is war.? Asked if France was involved in any planning towards war, he said: ?The French army is not at the moment associated with anything at all, nor with any manoeuvre at all.?

Tehran insists it only wants to master nuclear technology to produce electricity, but it has yet to comply with repeated UN demands that it halt uranium enrichment and other sensitive work that could potentially be used in producing weapons.