TEHRAN - Iranian President Mohamad Khatami has accused "a small, but influential group in the United States (of) threatening the world with war."
Khatami was speaking on Wednesday during a tour of a northern province bordering the Caspian Sea, the official IRNA news agency said on Thursday.
"We are not so selfish as to accuse all the American nation of being evil. However there is a small, but influential group in the United States that is threatening the world with war through their violent and war-mongering policies," IRNA quoted the normally mild-mannered president as saying.
"We have a national, religious and humanitarian duty to defend our country and we will not surrender to any aggressor," Khatami said.
Sharp rhetoric from Washington has sparked fierce debate in Tehran, which President George Bush accuses of forming part of an "axis of evil."
Some Iranian reformists have called for opening talks with the "Great Satan" and conservatives have demanded an end to dissent for the sake of national unity.
"We don't accuse the United States of being part of an axis of evil, although we believe that what Washington says today is clear proof of their evil," Khatami said.
The reformist president has always argued for trying to repair ties with Washington, but says it should first apologize for past misdeeds and ease sanctions on Iran.
Hard-liners who look to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei have ruled out any talks with their arch-enemy which cut ties with Iran in 1980 after radical students seized dozens of U.S. diplomats and held them hostage for 444 days.
HARD-LINER TALKS WITH U.S.?
Yet reformists have persistently accused conservatives in the last month of sending delegates to meet U.S. officials in Europe and on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus. They say talks should be conducted through official government channels.
Analysts say Khatami's hawkish comments on relations with Washington in the last week are an attempt to expose alleged conservative double-standards on the issue.
Hard-liners have denied conducting talks with U.S. officials, but a spokesman for Khatami's government said on Wednesday the Intelligence Ministry had been asked to investigate the charges.
Bush said in January that Iran, along with Iraq and North Korea, formed "an axis of evil" for trying to develop weapons of mass destruction.
Other U.S. leaders have since heaped blame on Iran, accusing the Islamic Republic of harboring al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters fleeing from neighboring Afghanistan -- charges Tehran denies.
In his speech Khatami also indirectly accused the United States of interfering in the Caspian Sea, where U.S. companies are involved in helping other littoral states develop its potentially rich energy resources.
"The Caspian Sea should be under the dominion of the five coastal countries and foreigners should not interfere in it," he said. "We want this sea to be a sea of peace and we are trying to reach a proper legal regime through dialogue and understanding."
The coastal states -- Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan -- have failed to agree on how to divide the sea's resources since the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991 which rendered older treaties out of date.
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