Mr. Straw arrived in Tehran Wednesday at the end of a diplomatic tour that had taken him to Paris, Cairo, Amman and Kuwait and was received by President Mohammad Khatami later on the day.

Informed diplomatic and press sources described the talks as "straight and open", with Mr. Khatami reiterating his British guest that though Iran had "enormously" suffered from Iraq, yet it could not accept an attack on its former enemy, unless authorised by the United Nations.

At a press conference in Paris on Wednesday, Mr. Abdolrazzaq Hashemi, an adviser to President Hoseyn, told IPS Iraq attaches high importance to establishing and keeping close relationship with Iran.

According to same source, Khatami has expressed Iran’s concerns not about the fall of Saddam (Hoseyn)-- which would be a good news for all Iranians --, but about after Saddam in the one hand and the situation in the Iraqi Kurdistan on the other.

Khatami also reminded Straw about the way Iran was rewarded by the Americans for the cooperation it had provided in toppling the Taleban and installing Hamed Karzai as interim Prime Minister in Kabol to explain why Iran could not trust the Americans.

He was referring to President George W. Bush’s placing the Islamic Republic among "evil states", alongside Iraq and North Korea.

He further asked, "Why then was Iraq supported the day when it invaded our country and occupied (the Iranian port of) Khorramshahr?; which powers equipped it with chemical weapons that were used against us and even its own (Kurdish) people?", the official Iranian news agency IRNA said about the Khatami-Straw talks.

Referring to the stands adopted by the West during the Iraqi-imposed War against Iran, Straw said that the West should take lessons from its past own mistakes, and not to repeat them again.

[On this, Iranian analysts said the Islamic Republic should blame its own diplomacy and not the countries that rushed to help the Iraqi aggressor.

After elaborating the reasons behind Iran's "strong" opposition to any unilateral attack on Iraq, the embattled Iranian President however agreed that Iraq must be obliged to abide by the resolutions of the international community.

The British Foreign Secretary said that his country does not favour the outbreak of a war in the region, hoping that the ongoing crisis would be settled in a peaceful manner.

He said that efforts aimed at disarming Iraq form weapons of mass destruction are launched based on the framework of U.N. General Assembly's will.

Straw also referred to the discussions among the Security Council members, emphasizing that extreme care must be taken to avoid getting killed of innocent human beings.

Straw assured Khatami that in case a war would break out in the region, naturally constant dialogue would be held with Iran and viewpoints would constantly be exchanged on the future of Iraq.

The president said that the American politicians' behaviour take root form arrogance and haste, and such political conduct can only result in the strengthening of extremist movements' activities inside the Islamic world, as well as weakening of the rationalist, democratic trends.

President Khatami also said that in order to achieve a lasting peace in the Middle East, the rights of all Palestinians, including those who live in Palestine, and the refugees, must be observed thoroughly, and Iran, without slightest interfering in other nations' affairs, favours the prevalence of a just peace in the region.

Khatami also expressed hope that the Tehran-London ties would be boosted with the beginning of the new British ambassador's work in Iran, who was also present during the meeting, based on mutual respect, particularly in economic fields.

During the meeting in the presence of Iran's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Straw said that London wishes for deeper, stronger relations with Tehran and that he is glad over the expansion of ties, and the recent developments in the fields of making investments, economic, and cultural activities.

Straw's trip is his third to Iran in the past 13 months. His visit in September last year, which just preceded the war in Afghanistan, was the first to be made by a British foreign secretary since the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1979.