"I hope that it is entirely realistic to come to a consensus in the days remaining before the New Year if our partners take a realistic approach and do not insist on certain positions which we are convinced have nothing to do with the task before us -- inducing Iran to talks and not trying to punish it," Lavrov was quoted as saying.

The Security Council's five veto-wielding members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- plus Germany have been struggling to reach consensus on a resolution because of Russia and China's opposition to harsh sanctions favoured by Western states.

Lavrov expressed "cautious optimism" about the course of the talks, saying: "We are succeeding in bringing our positions closer, the process continues, though artificial problems are appearing along the way."

Western negotiators are pushing for sanctions after Iran ignored a previous Security Council resolution calling for it to stop enriching uranium, which the West fears may be used for weapons development but which Iran insists is destined for its civilian energy programme.

Meanwhile, Iran is ready to hide its uranium enrichment and continue with the sensitive nuclear work if threatened with military attack, a senior Iranian official said Friday.

"We have a large country, 1 million 600 thousand square kilometres and for centrifuge machines (which enrich uranium) the room of this size is enough," Iran's ambassador to the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Ali Asghar Soltanieh told a seminar in Vienna in a medium-sized conference room.

Centrifuge machines "could be done, could be performed, could be installed anywhere and could be protected," he told a gathering at the Austrian Institute for International Affairs.

Soltanieh was speaking as the UN Security Council debates in New York whether to impose sanctions on Iran for failing to honour a Council ultimatum to suspend uranium enrichment, which makes what can be fuel for civilian nuclear reactors or the raw material for atom bombs.