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President Barack Obama will pressPrime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, one of NATOs twoMuslim members, for more support in curbing Irans nuclearprogram and rebuilding Afghanistan.

Erdogans government has been expanding trade ties withIran, which supplies about 20 percent of Turkeys natural gas.He visited Tehran in October and said that Irans nuclearprogram, which the U.S. suspects is a cover for weaponsdevelopment, is peaceful.

In a White House meeting today, Obama will probe Turkeyswillingness, as a member of the United Nations Security Council,to back new sanctions against Iran, an administration officialsaid. The U.S. also wants Turkey to increase its aid toAfghanistan, according to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The administration official, who spoke on condition ofanonymity, said Turkey could serve as a mediator only if it madeclear to Iranian officials that their nuclear program can onlybe for peaceful purposes.

American policy makers are going to want to use that newrelationship with Iran to take tough messages to Tehran aboutthe nuclear issue, said Ian Lesser, a Turkish-affairsspecialist at the German Marshall Fund of the U.S. inWashington.

Obama has said he will give Iran until the end of the yearto prove its program is for peaceful purposes or will seek new,multinational sanctions to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclearweapons.

The official also said that the U.S. will seek toclarify the Turkish position on Iran after Erdoganscomments on the Iranian program, which included praise for whathe called Irans positive approach to nuclear talks with theU.S. that collapsed after their Oct. 1 start.

If there was a UN Security Council vote on Iran sanctions,Turkey might abstain, Ilter Turkmen, a former Turkish foreignminister, said in a phone interview. If China and Russia goalong with the U.S. and vote for more sanctions then it couldput us in an awkward position, he said.

Erdogan said he will ask Obama to give more time for talkswith Iran before seeking sanctions at the UN Security Council,Sabah newspaper reported. Turkeys offer last month to storeIrans uranium can help end the crisis, Erdogan told reporterson his plane to Washington, the newspaper said.

Erdogan said yesterday before his departure that Turkey isalready doing what it can

In their meeting, Erdogan and Obama will also discussTurkeys troop commitment to Afghanistan, its role in northernIraq, the establishment of relations with Armenia and the futureof Cyprus, according to White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.

The administration official said Obama wouldnt ask Turkeyfor a specific number of new troops in Afghanistan. Turkishtroops serve in non-combat roles as part of the North AtlanticTreaty Organization force. Albania became NATOs secondmajority-Muslim member in April.

Obama earlier this month ordered another 30,000 U.S. troopsto Afghanistan and is pressing allies to increase contributions.

As Clinton attended the NATO gathering, Dan Feldman, deputyto U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke, who manages the Afghanistan andPakistan relationships, was in the Turkish capital Ankara. Hediscussed possible cooperation between the U.S. and Turkey oncivilian projects in Afghanistan.

We are always hopeful of getting even more assistancefrom Turkey because it is so important, Clinton said at NATOheadquarters in Brussels on Dec. 4. But we also are gratefulfor what we have received.

We maintain our reservations about the involvement ofTurkish troops in military operations and combat inAfghanistan, he said.

Turkish Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul said on Dec. 2 — aday after Obama urged allies to contribute more forces — therewas no shift in policy regarding keeping Turkish troops outof combat with the Taliban.

Public opinion in Turkey is turning more favorable towardthe U.S., reflecting an Obama bounce, said Ahmet Evin, aTurkish foreign policy expert at the Washington-basedTransatlantic Academy. The fading of the Iraq War, a majorirritant in relations during George W. Bushs presidency, isalso improving the public mood in Turkey, he said.

Erdogans visit to Washington — eight months after hehosted Obama in Ankara — comes as Turkey seeks to play a moreprominent role in its neighborhood, trying to broker aresumption of Israeli-Syrian peace talks and improving ties withIran.

Turkey sent hundreds of troops across its border intonorthern Iraq in February 2008 for more than a week, heighteningconcern in Washington over Iraqi stability.

Erdogan may ask Obama to put more pressure on the Kurdishadministration in the northern region of Iraq to prevent theKurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, from attacking Turkishtargets.

To contact the reporter on this story:Janine Zacharia in Washington at jzacharia@bloomberg.net .