Baghdad: Iraq is sending envoys to European capitals to rally support against US plans to overthrow President Saddam Hussein, as a top Iraqi official on September 1 denied that his country is working to obtain nuclear weapons.

Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz said in an interview broadcast worldwide on Cable News Network that Iraq is not working to obtain nuclear weapons.

"We are not working on this," said Aziz, interviewed from Johannesburg.

"The United States have provided no evidence to support the allegations," he added, alluding to statements by US Vice President Dick Cheney and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

On August 29, Cheney told a gathering of Korean War veterans in Texas that Iraq continued to "pursue an aggressive nuclear weapons program", and that many in Washington "are convinced that Saddam will acquire such weapons fairly soon".

The Europeans, many of whom were alarmed by Cheney's war talk, have sought to cool tempers and urged diplomacy rather than belligerency in dealing with Iraq.

However, EU foreign ministers, meeting in Denmark, did press Baghdad on August 31 to readmit UN weapons inspectors immediately.

Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan on September 1 announced plans to dispatch envoys to European Union member states after warmly praising the 15-nation bloc for refusing to toe Washington's hard line.