Iran still defied Resolution 1747 of the United Nations Security
Council (UNSC) and expanded its uranium enrichment program, said
the report of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to the
UNSC on Wednesday.
The report was referred to the 35 member states of IAEA's Board
of Governors, diplomats in IAEA told Xinhua.
Iran on the same day dismissed the report as "devoid of any new
points" and insisted there is no obstacle for the agency's
inspections of its nuclear sites.
Iran's permanent representative to the IAEA, Ali Soltanieh, said
in Vienna, "the report of UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed
ElBaradei on Iran's nuclear program is devoid of any new
points."
"Iran has not breached any of its international commitments, and
that our activities have no deviation from peaceful objectives," he
said.
The IAEA report said that Iran's establishment in Natanz had
fixed 1,300 centrifuges, three times more than the amount the IAEA
learned about in February, and the other hundreds of centrifuges
were still in test.
Iran had informed the IAEA that it could churn out small amount
of uranium enriched to 4.8 percent at present.
Soltanieh said, "although Iran has pursued its enrichment
activities, it has never created any obstacles in the way of the
agency's inspections, or made any attempt aimed at delaying them,
pursuing full cooperation with IAEA inspectors."
The pendent problems about Iranian nuclear issues were still in
the air, and the IAEA could neither grip and evaluate the fact of
Iran's nuclear program, nor affirm Iran's peaceful intention, said
the report.
The diplomats in Vienna said that the United States and Britain
would impel the UNSC to take much severer sanctions against Iran,
if Iran defied the resolution of the Security Council.
They believed that this report would reinflame a debate on the
new resolution against Iran in the UN in coming weeks.
According to media reports, ElBaradei said in a recent interview
that in order to make progress, Iran might be allowed to develop
limited research on uranium enrichment activities, with the
precondition that Iran did not build the industrial productive
system for uranium enrichment and would be subject to the strict
inspection of the IAEA.
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However, the United States and some other Western countries
expressed immediately their strong opposition against ElBaradei's
suggestion.
The UNSC ratified Resolution 1747 on Iran's nuclear issues on
March 24, which required Iran to implement Resolution 1737 without
hesitation, and suspend all uranium enrichment activities with the
verification of the IAEA.
Resolution 1747 also required the IAEA to refer a report to the
UNSC in 60 days on whether Iran complies with the resolution or
not.
Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani on Wednesday was
quoted by the state television as saying that Iran continues to
cooperate with the IAEA and abide by its commitment to carry out
the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
(Xinhua News Agency May 24, 2007)
