The New Nation - Internet Edition

AFP, Tehran

Iran's new chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili on Friday brushed aside the latest US sanctions saying they would have no affect on the country's nuclear policies, the ISNA news agency reported.

"These sanctions are nothing new. Sanctions have been imposed on us for 28 years. The new sanctions, like all those before, will have no affect on Iran's policies," Jalili said at Tehran airport on his return from talks in Rome with European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

"The sanctions will only isolate the United States on the international stage," he said of the measures against Tehran, unveiled on Thursday.

The US sanctions specifically targeted the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, accused of spreading weapons of mass destruction, and the IRGC's elite Quds Force, which was labelled a supporter of terrorism.

Three Iranian state-owned banks were also blacklisted, along with IRGC-controlled companies and the logistics arm of Iran's defence ministry, as Washington stepped up a drive to squeeze Iran out of global banking.

Despite already being under UN Security Council sanctions, Tehran refuses to suspend its controversial programme of uranium enrichment, which the West fears to be a cover for atomic weapons development, a charge Iran denies. Jalili and his predecessor Ali Larijani, who resigned unexpectedly on Saturday following differences with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad over the handling of Iran's nuclear case, both attended the talks in Italy with Solana. Iran and the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, are also continuing talks following an agreement reached in August for Tehran to provide answers to outstanding questions over its nuclear programme including plutonium experiments and centrifuges.

Centrifuges are used to enrich uranium to make nuclear fuel. In a highly enriched form, the material can also be used to make the explosive core of a nuclear bomb.