"We understand that the use of economic sanctions or military operations would probably have the opposite result" of what is desired, said Igor Shuvalov, Russia's main envoy to the Group of Eight (G8) and a top advisor to President Vladimir Putin.

"Russia may or may not support sanctions, but President Putin has often made clear that sanctions for the sake of sanctions would have an opposite effect," Shuvalov told journalists.

Shuvalov made the comments after Tehran defied an August 31 Security Council deadline for it to halt uranium enrichment.

The envoy praised a package of incentives put forward by the West aimed at getting Iran to halt enrichment as "very balanced", but said that talk of "carrots and sticks" to secure Iranian compliance was naive.

"Do we know how to use a carrot and stick with Iran? The answer is: no one does. If we did, this problem would have been solved a long time ago. We are in favor of using a stick, but we don't want that stick then to fall on our heads," Shuvalov said.

Shuvalov reiterated that Russia was keen to prevent Iran developing nuclear weapons, pointing out the close proximity of the two countries and potential destabilising factors in relations.

"For Russia it would be very bad if they had nuclear weapons," he said.

All rights reserved. © 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.