President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad today hit back at President Bush's State of the Union pledge to confront Iran's regime.

The Iranian leader described the US as a "hollow superpower... tainted with the blood of nations" as he repeated the mantra that Iran had a "right" to nuclear power.

President Ahmadinejad told thousands of people gathered in the Gulf port city of Bushehr for the 27th anniversary of the Islamic revolution: "I am telling those fake superpowers that the Iranian nation became independent 27 years ago and on the nuclear case it will resist until fully achieving its rights.

"Our nation can't give in to the coercion of some bully countries who imagine they are the whole world and see themselves equal to the entire globe," he said.

Responding to President Bush's claim that Iran was "a nation held hostage by a small clerical elite" he branded the American leader a criminal. To cheers, he said: "Those whose arms are stained up to the elbow with the blood of other nations are now accusing us of violating human rights and freedoms. God willing, we shall drag you to trial."

The rhetoric hit a new peak at a ceremony in Tehran, where the Defence Minister, Mostafa Mohammad Najjar, said that Iran would give a "quick and extremely destructive response" to any military attack on its nuclear facilities. He also hinted that it would use its influence in southern Iraq and Palestine to stir up trouble for the West in response to threatened sanctions.

Jack Straw admitted today that Iran has so far turned a deaf ear to international pressure, but urged the republic nonetheless to realise that it had one last chance to come clean over its suspect nuclear project.

The Foreign Secretary, who is meeting Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki privately in London today, said that a decision by world leaders to take Iran to the UN Security Council represented "a final opportunity" for it to convince the world of that its nuclear aspirations are entirely peaceful.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the global nuclear watchdog. will meet tomorrow in Vienna to discuss Iran's actions. At the meeting, the E3 - the UK, France and Germany - are expected to formally end their attempts to resolve the crisis through negotiation, and to hand the matter over to the UN Security Council, which has the ability to impose economic sanctions against Iran when it meets in March.

Iran has said it will immediately halt voluntary dealings with the IAEA, which include unscheduled checks of its atomic sites, if sent to the council.

Mr Straw said: "He [Mottaki] really needs to see this position not as a threat but as a final opportunity for Iran to put itself back on track. On track for absolutely, certainly being able to produce electricity by nuclear power but on track too for meeting its obligations ... not to do anything that could lead to the development of a nuclear weapons capability."

Iran announced early in January it was resuming nuclear research which had been suspended for two years. It claims that the research is for entirely peaceful ends, but there are fears that it could pursue a weapons programme.

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