The latest round of meetings came despite pressure on Iran from the United States and the European Union to freeze its civilian nuclear programme.

"The Iranian delegation arrived in Moscow on Saturday and started talks with representatives of our company," a spokeswoman for Atomstroiexport, Irina Essipova, told the Itar-Tass news agency.

The negotiations were over problems linked to the financing of the construction of the power station, she told the Ria Novositi agency.

Executives from the Russian company returned to Moscow last week after talks in Tehran and Bushehr on fitting out the first reactor, the news agency.

The talks with Tehran focused on financing the project. The visit to Bushehr, in southern Iran, was to deal with technical aspects of the project, which was 95 percent ready, Essipova told Novosti.

On Tuesday, Russian security council secretary Igor Ivanov said that Russia would not be able to finish the station on schedule because of technical and financial problems.

"It is clear that we have to extend the deadline. By how long, we do not know. It is being studied by experts," he told reporters.

The completion of the power station by Atomstroiexport and the delivery of nuclear fuel by Russia, planned for this year, were delayed by what Moscow described earlier as financial problems.

Russia had accused Iran of not paying the amounts agreed upon in a deal reached last September. By the end of March this year, however, Moscow acknowledged that Tehran had resumed its payments.

Russia signed the original deal with Iran on the station back in 1995.

Earlier delays in the project were due in part to political pressure from the United States.

Washington and the European Union want Iran to freeze enrichment as the process can be used both to make nuclear fuel and atomic weapons. Iran insists its nuclear programme is solely aimed at generating energy.

In Tehran Sunday, a foreign ministry spokesman made it clear that Iran would press ahead with its nuclear programme despite calls from Washington and Brussels that it be suspended.

"Halting uranium enrichment is definitely deleted from the literature of Iran's nuclear activities," spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told reporters.

He was speaking just days ahead of talks scheduled for Wednesday with EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

The UN Security Council has already imposed two sets of sanctions against Iran for refusing to halt sensitive atomic activities and has threatened to take further punitive action if Tehran's defiance continues.

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