"A safeguards team is traveling in the next couple of days to deliver and install remote camera equipment and an inspection system will be in place in the middle of next week" at the uranium conversion facility in Isfahan, Melissa Fleming, spokeswoman for the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, told AFP.

Iranian negotiator Hossein Moussavian had said Thursday in Tehran that Iran would resume preliminary fuel cycle work at Isfahan within one or two days but the IAEA has said that it needs until next week to set up monitoring at Isfahan and weigh nuclear material there.

The European Union, which is negotiating with Iran to win guarantees that it will not develop nuclear weapons, has threatened to break off talks and bring Tehran before the UN Security Council if the Iranians go ahead with conversion.

Conversion is a first step in enriching uranium into what can be fuel for civilian power plants but also the raw material for atom bombs.