NATO would protect its member countries and populations with an anti-missile shield if Iran got its hands on a nuclear bomb, the alliance's secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Thursday.

Speaking in Berlin before a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Rasmussen said: "First, let me stress that NATO as such is not a part in the international endeavours to put pressure on Iran right now."

"I do hope that we, through diplomatic and political pressure, are able to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear capability," he added.

If Tehran were to become nuclear armed, however, "it might of course eventually become NATO business as well, because then it is a question of protecting our territories and our populations against a potential threat."

"To that end, we are right now considering the possibility to establish missile defence which also covers Europe," the NATO boss said.

Talks with Iran over its disputed nuclear programme appeared to stall earlier Thursday as delegates from the UN atomic watchdog met in Vienna.

Expressing his "disappointment" at Iran, the outgoing head of the body, Mohamed ElBaradei, said that efforts to verify the exclusively peaceful nature of Tehran's nuclear drive had reached a dead end.

earlier related report
US reaches deal on troops in Poland: spokesman
Warsaw (AFP) Nov 26, 2009 - The United States and Poland have agreed terms for stationing US troops in Poland so that the deployment of US Patriot missiles can start next year, an official said Thursday.

"Talks on an agreement allowing the military presence of the United States in our country have been concluded successfully," Polish defence ministry spokesman Robert Rochowicz told AFP.

He refused, however, to confirm Polish media reports that the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) deal would be formally inked in Warsaw on December 10 by Ellen Tauscher, US under secretary for arms control and international security affairs, and Poland's deputy minister Stanislaw Komorowski.

The SOFA deal was a pre-requisite to setting up a US ground-to-air missile base in Poland. US officials say deployment should start in 2010.

During an October 21 visit to Warsaw by US Vice President Joe Biden, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said his country was ready to join a new US anti-missile system.

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said the United States also wants to deploy SM-3 missiles in Poland and the neighbouring Czech Republic in 2015.

Gates' announcement came after President Barack Obama scrapped a plan agreed in 2008 to install a controversial anti-missile shield system in the two countries.

The shield, promoted by President George W. Bush when he was in office, had angered Russia which considered it a threat to Russian security.

The Patriots and SM-3s are part of the new system proposed by the United States.