Soccer-crazy Teheran maintains that politics shouldn't influence events on the field and says Iran's nuclear program is no reason for the country to be banned from 2006 World Cup. The secretary of the Iranian Football Federation, Mohammad Pahelvan, told reporters Wednesday that world football governing body FIFA was "a powerful entity and would not allow anyone to interfere" and operates free from any "political, religious and ethnic framework." His comments came after Iranian media quoted US policy analyst Patrick Clawson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy as saying barring football-mad Iran from football's biggest event would be one possible way of exerting pressure on the country over its drive for nuclear technology. Iran has only ever played in the World Cup finals in 1978 and 1998 and erupted into mass festivities in July after earning a place in Germany. Iran is presently at loggerheads with the UN's nuclear watchdog, having earlier this month ended a freeze of uranium conversion work -- a precursor of the enrichment process that can be diverted to military purposes.