The United States, in a policy shift, will offer Iran economic incentives to abandon its suspected pursuit of nuclear weapons, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Reuters on Friday. "We will make clear that we will lift our objections to an Iranian application to the WTO and that we are prepared to lift an objection to the licensing of spare parts for Iranian commercial aircraft," Rice said in an interview. "The decision that the president has taken is that the United States will make an effort to actively support the EU3 negotiations with the Iranians," Rice added, referring to a British-French-German diplomatic effort to negotiate an end to Iran's suspected nuclear weapons program. The united approach marks a milestone in efforts to curb what Washington believes is Iran's attempts to develop nuclear arms. Iran has denied it is seeking atomic weapons and has said its civilian nuclear program is for peaceful power generation. The U.S. decision to embrace economic incentives is a significant reversal from Washington's previous refusal to reward Iran for what it regards as bad behavior. --More 2246 Local Time 1946 GMT
