Monday, March 6 2006 14:20 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today(Mar 6,2006) made it clear that India is not part of any international effort on regime change in the region and favoured diplomacy being given more time to resolve the Iran nuclear issue. "We are not part of any international effort for any regime change in our region," Singh said replying to clarifications in the Rajya Sabha on the Iran issue.

Singh said the issue figured during his talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday night.

"Our emphasis is and sincere desire is that this matter should be resolved without any recourse to coercive methods and any sort of confrontation and diplomacy must be given adequate space," he said adding Putin shared his views and that Russia was also working on the same line.

Singh said he discussed with Putin several issues of bilateral cooperation.

Replying to another question raised by Nilotpal Basu (CPI-M), Singh said "I have stated very clearly that we do not stand for confrontation. Confrontation is not in the interest of our country and confrontation is not in the interest of the Gulf region."

"We want peace and stability to be comprehensive in this region. It will be our effort to work with other like-minded countries including members of Non-aligned Movement to ensure mutually satisfactory resolution of this complex problem.

Diplomacy must be given time to succeed," he said.