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Iran Denies Nuclear Violations

March 09, 2004
Reuters
Louis Charbonneau and Paul Hughes

VIENNA/TEHRAN -- Iran says it has not violated the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, but Washington and top EU states are close to agreement on a U.N. resolution strongly hinting Tehran has a weapons program.

"It is a mistake to say that Iran has violated its commitments and Tehran will definitely not accept it," Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi told the official IRNA news agency on Tuesday as the U.N. nuclear watchdog's Board of Governors met.

International Atomic Energy Agency head Mohamed ElBaradei criticized Iran on Monday for failing to declare advanced "P2" centrifuges that can be used to make atomic bombs and said both Iran and Libya had violated the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Diplomats said negotiators for the European Union's "Big Three," France, Germany and Britain, agreed with counterparts from the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand on the text of an IAEA resolution to be sent to capitals for comments and possible revisions.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the resolution would signal to Tehran it would be punished if it continued to defy the IAEA but stopped short of reporting Iran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions.

"We're not looking for a formal noncompliance resolution at this time, but we're seeking a strong resolution that keeps pressure on Iran to comply with all its obligations," he told reporters.

Iran says its program is purely peaceful, but the draft refers to ElBaradei's finding in his February 24 report that "most of the workshops used in Iran's centrifuge enrichment program are 'owned by military industrial organizations.'"

Tehran's U.N. delegation submitted a letter to the IAEA board saying this part of the report was "not correct" and only "three out of 10 workshops" belonged to the defense industry.

WESTERN QUESTIONS

"(Iranians) say the program is civilian, but there are doubts," said one Western diplomat, declining to be named.

"If it is civilian, why did they produce plutonium, why did they produce polonium-210, why are workshops owned by military industrial organizations?" the diplomat said, referring to weapons-usable items found by the IAEA in Iran.

The IAEA usually seeks to adopt resolution by consensus and diplomats said the agreement on the text of the resolution was not final.

With scant support for a stronger censure, Washington has decided to put off reporting Iran to the Security Council. The United States expects continued IAEA inspections will unearth more evidence that will build its case for going to the world body's council, a senior State Department official said.

"More of these inspections, more of these efforts can clarify what we pass on to the U.N., when we do," the official, who asked not to be named, said. He added it was a "logical conclusion" Iran would eventually be referred to the council.

He said the resolution negotiations were "going along properly" and after working on the draft with Germany, France and Britain, the United States had begun trying to get other nations on board.

Diplomats from the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which has 13 out of 35 seats on the board, said it was unclear if the draft would be acceptable to them or if it was even needed.

"We don't believe a resolution was necessary," Malaysian ambassador Gulam Haniff told reporters on behalf on the NAM.

"It's important that this be passed by consensus," he said.

The draft praises Tehran for signing the Additional Protocol in December permitting IAEA snap inspections of nuclear sites, but calls on Iran's parliament to ratify it quickly.

Iran's hardline commentator and newspaper editor Hossein Shariatmadari said Tehran should consider following North Korea's example and quit the NPT if the IAEA did not wrap up its 13-month probe of Iran soon.

The draft, put forward by Australia and Canada and backed by the United States and New Zealand, made a clear comparison between Iran and Libya saying they got similar nuclear equipment "from the same foreign sources."

But Kharrazi said Iran and Libya, which admitted to its programs in December and has begun dismantling them, should not be compared.

"Comparing Iran and Libya is incorrect," he said. "Libya has officially announced that it was pursuing nuclear weapons and this is a violation of the NPT, but Iran has not been pursuing nuclear weapons and (has) not violated the NPT."

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040309/325/eo40b.html

Iran Moves Uranium Enrichment to Secret Plants

March 09, 2004
Reuters
The New York Times

VIENNA -- An exile who has previously released key nuclear information about Iran said on Tuesday Iranian leaders decided at a recent meeting to seek an atom bomb "at all costs" and begin enriching uranium at secret plants.

Alireza Jafarzadeh, who disclosed in August 2002 that Iran had a hidden uranium enrichment facility at Natanz and a heavy-water plant at Arak, told Reuters his new information came from the same "well-informed sources inside Iran."

He was a spokesman for the National Council of Resistance of Iran before the United States, which lists it as a terrorist organization, closed the NCRI's Washington office last year.

He said the Islamic republic's top leaders, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, gathered after the father of Pakistan's atomic weapons program, Abdul Qadeer Khan, admitted leaking nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

"At this recent meeting, they decided to join the nuclear [weapons] club at all costs," Jafarzadeh said, adding that the leaders decided it was "vital for the survival" of the country.

"They set a timetable to get a bomb by the end of 2005 at the latest," he said, speaking from Washington.

Iran has repeatedly denied trying to develop atomic weapons, saying its nuclear program is purely peaceful. Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said on Tuesday that Tehran had not violated the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Jafarzadeh said the people at the meeting said they would have to stop enriching uranium at Natanz, as Tehran had promised France, Britain and Germany in October. But in order to make the weapons-grade uranium needed for a bomb, they decided to move their enrichment to smaller secret sites in the country.

"They will heavily rely on smaller secret enrichment sites at Karaj, Esfahan and at other places," he said.

Jafarzadeh said Tehran was in a better position to hide the full extent of its centrifuge enrichment program from United Nations inspectors now it was able to build centrifuges domestically, without relying on imports.

The allegations came as the governing board of the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) meets in Vienna this week to discuss a resolution on Iran's failure to inform the IAEA about its advanced centrifuge enrichment research.

Jafarzadeh said the Iranian leaders also agreed at their secret meeting to adopt a generally "aggressive and confrontational approach" with the IAEA before "muscling their way to the finish line to get the bomb."

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-nuclear-iran.html

IAEA TO PASS A STRONG RESOLUTION ON IRAN

TEHRAN-VIENNA, 9 Mar. (IPS)

Iranian Foreign Affairs Minister Kamal Kharrazi on Tuesday dismissed as "wrong" the allegations made by the UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohammad ElBarade’i that Iran had breached its commitments and warned it will "not accept" being declared as having violated nuclear safeguards agreements or being compared to Libya".

"It is wrong to say that Iran has violated its commitments, and Tehran will certainly not accept this, as it is also an error to compare Iran to Libya, because Libya officially declared it was seeking nuclear weapons, which constitutes a violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)", he was quoted by the official Iranian news agency IRNA, in reaction to Mr. ElBrade’i accusing the Islamic Republic and Libya for being "in breach of their obligations under the safeguards agreement" of the NPT.

"In view of many years of violation of non-proliferation obligations by Libya and Iran, I am asking for the provision of information and a full measure of transparency", Mr. ElBradeh’i had stated on Monday to the Agency’s Board of Directors that had rejected a key demand from Tehran to take the Iranian case off its agenda, voicing "serious concern" at omissions in Tehran's declarations about its nuclear activities.

"I am seriously concerned that Iran's October declaration did not include any reference to its possession of P2 centrifuge designs and related R&D (Research and Development), which in my view was a setback to Iran's stated policy of transparency", Dr. ElBarade’i told the 35 members Board.

He also singled out Tehran's failure to mention that it had designs for advanced centrifuges capable of producing highly enriched uranium for use in a nuclear reactor or, potentially, in an atomic weapon.

But Kharazi said the IAEA chief was merely referring to "failures, which are very different to violations."

"Most of these failures are in the past and are being corrected," the Iranian Foreign Affairs Minister said.

There was also an angry reaction from Mr. Hoseyn Moussavian, Iran’s former ambassador to Germany who now is a close aide to Hojjatoleslam Hasan Rohani, the influential Secretary of Iran’s Supreme Council for National Security and main negotiator with the IAEA.

"For several years, Iran has been fully cooperating with the agency, so we do not expect these kind of statements from Mr. ElBaradei," he said, adding that Tehran hoped the IAEA chief's "serious error" would be "corrected".

"The case concerning Iran's peaceful nuclear activities should be completely closed at the IAEA Board of Governors and removed from its agenda", Mr. Rohani, had said during the inaugural session of the Assembly of Experts, an all clerics 86 seats body that convenes twice a year and had the power the elect or dismiss the leader of the regime.

He also called on the Atomic Club to admit Iran as a full member, as it is mastering the full circle of nuclear processing, including enriching uranium.

His demand surprised nuclear experts as membership at the Atomic Club means that one can also produce nuclear weapons, something that Iran insists adamantly that is not the case.

But Mr. Elbradeh’i said the issue would be removed from the agenda "when we are done with all the issues that are outstanding".

"The main issue is the nature of Tehran's enrichment program and the origin of highly enriched uranium found by U.N. inspectors last year" he added.

According to an IAEA report made public last month, Tehran was accused of continuing to hide evidence of nuclear experiments unearthed by agency inspectors, dealing Iran a setback in its efforts to convince the world that its nuclear program is peaceful and that it is fully cooperating with the U.N. agency.

Iranian Ambassador to Austria who now also represents his country to the Vienna-based international nuclear watchdog Pirooz Pirhoseyni told reporters that Tehran was the victim of a "war of propaganda" and the press had misquoted Iranian officials last year as saying the October dossier was complete.

"At the time...we were not obliged to announce some of our researches, as we had not finished them" he explained.

However, he promised that Iran’s nuclear projects would be open to IAEA inspections saying, "we will give the Agency all the information it considers important to know, according to the additional Protocol that Tehran has signed last December, but has not been approved by the Parliament.

American ambassador Kenneth Brill shot back, telling correspondents he thought it was striking that the more the agency learns the more the Iranians have to change their stories.

Correspondents in Vienna said contrary to their previous stand, Britain, France and Germany that has achieved an agreement with Mr. Rohani last October for Iranian signing the Additional Protocol to the Non Proliferation Treaty and suspending enriching uranium have now coming closer to American position, calling for a more stringent resolution by the IAEA on Iran.

In a bold article on Sunday, "Keyhan", a hard line Iranian newspaper close to Ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i, the regime’s leader, urged lawmakers at the next Majles to reject the Protocol if the IAEA, "under pressures from the United States and Zionist circles continue with its biased, irrational and dishonest treatment of the Islamic Republic".

Iran insists it is building a nuclear program purely to generate electricity. The United States accuses Tehran of systematic deception and says it is bent on acquiring nuclear weapons.

ElBaradei urged Tehran to ensure full transparency and help restore international confidence by "taking the initiative to provide all relevant information in full detail and in a prompt manner."

Revelations in recent weeks that a top Pakistani atomic scientist sold nuclear secrets to Iran, North Korea and Libya have intensified international concern that "rogue states" or terrorists could get their hands on weapons of mass destruction.

Instead of Iran, the Board of Governors got Libya out of its agenda after Colonel Mu’ammar Ghaddafi unexpectedly renounced all Libya’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs in December and called on Iran and North Korea to follow his example.

IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Russia took delivery Monday of an air cargo of highly enriched uranium removed from Libya as part of Tripoli's disarmament.

She told reporters the uranium was 80 percent enriched, very close to being pure enough to use in a nuclear weapon. Russia would now blend it down into low-enriched uranium.

Fleming also said Libya, along with Niger, would sign an Additional Protocol to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty on Wednesday, permitting instant and unrestricted inspections to verify its future compliance.

ElBarade’i informed the Board about "an extensive international network of black-market proliferators", telling the governors that export controls needed to become "broader and tighter", and mechanisms must be put in place to ensure the agency was told of all sensitive nuclear or nuclear-related technology transfers.

He said he would soon appoint expert groups to look at the possibility of setting up regional centres to tighten control over activities like nuclear fuel production, processing of weapons-usable material and disposal of waste.

"The nuclear non-proliferation regime remains under stress, and a range of measures will be needed to restore confidence in its effectiveness", he said.

ENDS IRAN IAEA NUCLEAR 9304

http://www.iran-press-service.com/articles_2004/Mar_04/iran_iaea_nuclear_9304.htm