Posted on 05/24/2007 1:21:37 AM PDT by familyop
The UN's nuclear watchdog on Wednesday said Iran was forging ahead with its nuclear programme and limiting access to international monitors, one day before yet another UN deadline for Iran to halt its nuclear activities was set to pass unheeded.
The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency said Iran had nearly doubled its uranium enrichment capacity since the IAEA's last report in February, but that knowledge of Iran's nuclear programme was diminishing at the same time.
"The agency's level of knowledge of certain aspects of Iran's nuclear-related activities has deteriorated," the report said, adding that progress in its inquiry into the programme had come to a standstill.
The UN Security Council, which received the report during a closed-door session in New York, was considering its next move. On Thursday the 15-nation council's latest deadline for Iran to suspend enrichment, issued in a March resolution, will expire.
"What (the report) shows is that the government in Iran is not in compliance with UN resolutions, it is not sharing information and its protestation of peaceful intent is not credible," Zalmay Khalilzad, US ambassador to the UN and current Security Council president, told reporters after the meeting.
Tehran's lack of cooperation left the IAEA in no position to determine the true intention of Iran's nuclear programme, which the country kept hidden from UN inspectors for almost two decades, the IAEA said.
Western nations fear Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons. Teheran denies the charge, and on Wednesday said the report was "another document proving the peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear programmes."
Iran's IAEA envoy Ali-Asqar Soltanieh told Mehr news agency that the report confirmed that there was no proof indicating any divergence in Iran's nuclear programmes "towards prohibited (military) aims," and that all projects have transparently been reported to and registered with the IAEA.
Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani accused the Security Council of "following a political rather than a technical approach" with regards to Iran's nuclear case.
Khalilzad said Washington will work with council members "to take appropriate action with the aim of increasing the pressure on the government of Iran" for compliance with the council's requirements.
Khalilzad said the US was not opposed to peaceful use of nuclear energy, but that Iran had transgressed the limits of civilian nuclear power.
Other UN diplomats said the IAEA report will be studied in coming days and the council will then discuss what action to take.
Iran has ignored repeated Security Council resolutions calling for the country to suspend its enrichment activities. The council's last resolution in March tightened sanctions on Iran that were first imposed in December, and had set a deadline of Thursday after which it would consider further action.
Iran stopped implementing an agreement reached with the IAEA to provide greater transparency - a deal separate from its obligations under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)- after the country was reported to the Security Council more than one year ago.
For the IAEA to complete its mission, Iran would have to go beyond its legal obligations under the NPT, one UN official said.
Iran last week said that 1,600 of a planned 3,000 centrifuges - used to spin out uranium sufficiently enriched to fuel an energy plant - were already working at its key Natanz plant.
The IAEA said it believed Iran could complete its plan to reach 3,000 centrifuges by late June. But it remained unclear how fast Iran could make progress, as the IAEA had no access to the centrifuge production sites.
Iran told the IAEA it had managed to enrich uranium to 4.8 per cent, enough for the production of nuclear fuel. For building nuclear weapons, uranium enriched to approximately 90 per cent is necessary.
IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei had recently stirred controversy for saying that, with Iran having mastered the technology, Iran should be allowed to partially continue its programme. IAEA officials did not comment on recent news reports that France was willing to join the US in a complaint against ElBaradei.
While the IAEA made some progress on monitoring the enrichment facilities, ElBaradei's report also expressed its concerns about Iran refusing to provide the UN nuclear watchdog with design information on its heavy water plant at Arak.
Easily solved!
Just have some one write the Iranians a letter and ask them to update us on where the stand.
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