The Hague, Netherlands - U.S. Sec. of State Hillary Rodham Clinton shared a conference table Tuesday with a senior Iranian diplomat at an international session on the future of Afghanistan, but did not react to the Iranian's call for a buildup of Afghan security.

    Clinton did not mention Iran, which shares a nearly 600-mile border with Afghanistan, at the outset of an international strategy session proposed by Washington. The conference was billed as the sort of "big tent" session where U.S. and Iranian diplomats might happen to bump into one another.

    Washington ruled out what it called "substantive" discussions with the Iranians ahead of the session, and Clinton told reporters aboard a flight to the conference that she had no plans to seek them out. Still, she added Monday that it was a good sign that Iran decided to come.

    Sitting at the far end of a conference table from Clinton, Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Medhi Akhundzadeh said that the "buildup of Afghanistan's security capacity is the surest and least costly way" to overcome terrorism.

    Despite the Obama administration's new plans for building up Afghanistan's police force and army, Clinton laid out the overhaul of the U.S. war and development effort without responding to the Iranian's remarks.

    "The range of countries and institutions that are represented here shows the universal recognition that what happens in Afghanistan matters to us all," Clinton told the gathering of about 80 nations and organizations.

    The top U.S. diplomat echoed President Barack Obama, who joins her in Europe this week, in saying the cost of failure in Afghanistan would be too high. The backsliding war in Afghanistan is a main theme of Obama's first European trip as president, with allies eager to see Obama use the issue to make an overture to Tehran. Obama left Washington on Tuesday.

    NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer has urged the U.S. and other members of the Western military alliance to work alongside Iran to combat Taliban militants. But despite sharing the same large table at the U.N.-sponsored discussion, U.S. diplomats exchanged only a few well-publicized pleasantries with Iranian delegates.

    "The international community has declared that by being present in Afghanistan it intends to help the people of the country in establishing security," Akhundzadeh said, in remarks that also avoided any direct mention of the United States.

    "It has to safeguard this objective and refrain from any kind of deviation from this motto or from giving priority to political or military matters."

    Iranian political analyst Saeed Leilaz said the presence of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan works to Iran's benefit, because they hold the Taliban at bay.

    "However, Iran cannot openly support U.S. presence in Afghanistan due to its anti-American image in the world, as well as its old disputes with Washington," Leilaz said.

    The United States broke diplomatic ties with Iran after the U.S. Embassy was overrun and diplomats taken hostage during the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The revolution toppled the pro-U.S. shah and brought to power a government of Islamic clerics.

    The U.S. cooperated with Iran in late 2001 and 2002 in the Afghanistan conflict, but the promising contacts fizzled - and were extinguished completely when former President George W. Bush called Iran part of an "Axis of Evil."

    Obama campaigned with a pledge to talk face-to-face with Iranian leaders if it proved in U.S. interests to do so. Lower-level contacts would presumably come first. Tuesday's meeting was the first major opportunity, and it followed an unusual outreach by Obama this month.

    Obama send video greetings for the Persian new year celebration and expressed hope for better ties.

    Iran's supreme leader said there will be no change between the two countries unless the American president puts an end to U.S. hostility toward Iran.

    "They chant the slogan of change but no change is seen in practice. We haven't seen any change," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said.

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    AP reporter Nasser Karimi contributed to this report from Tehran.