Iran still wants nuclear weapons: US

Iran still seeking to acquire nuclear weapons, despite commitments to the contrary made to the international community, US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said on Thursday.

"We have been following the question of Iran pretty closely and there's no doubt in our mind that Iran continues to pursue a nuclear weapons program," Armitage said in an interview with Washington's Salem Radio Network.

Earlier US Under Secretary of State for Disarmament John Bolton made a similar comment in Berlin.

Iran "not been fully forthcoming with their arrangement with the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] and we need to continue our effort, along with our European friends, to gain compliance," Armitage said.

The IAEA said in Vienna on Thursday it had found undeclared plans in Iran for a sophisticated model of a gas centrifuge, used to man nuclear materials, after Tehran had promised to open all of its nuclear programs for IAEA inspection.

But Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi said in Rome that his country had no plans for the development of nuclear weapons, and reaffirmed its willingness to cooperate with the IAEA.

"The burden of proof is on the one who makes the allegations," he told reporters.

"Certainly we are not following any program to produce weapons," he said.

Western in Vienna said the IAEA uncovered designs for an advanced enrichment centrifuge that should have been mentioned in Iran's October declaration of its atomic program.

Tehran at the time its declaration was true and complete and has always denied it was trying to make a nuclear bomb.

Next IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei is expected to circulate two reports on UN inspections, one on Iran and the other on Libya, which admitted in December to pursuing weapons of mass destruction and agreed to voluntarily give them up.

Diplomats there were striking parallels between the nuclear programs of Iran and Libya.

They said the absence of the centrifuge designs from the October declaration was a serious omission.

"This, in fact, is the smoking gun," said Henry Sokolski, head of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center.

He said the IAEA governing board should report Iran next month to the UN Security Council, which can impose economic sanctions.

In contrast to his harsh words about Iran, Bolton said the US was considering lifting its sanctions on Libya though the timing would depend on how fast Tripoli disarms.

POWER-PLANT DEAL

For its part, Russia continued to defy US pressure to sever nuclear ties with the Islamic Republic as Russian Atomic Energy Minister Alexander Rumyantsev indicated Moscow would sign a deal with Iran next month to ship nuclear fuel for Iran's Bushehr power plant.

Tehran Moscow have been locked in months of tough talks over nuclear shipments for the US$800 million Bushehr plant Russia has helped to build despite repeated US accusations that Iran is secretly trying to acquire nuclear arms.

Rumyantsev he hoped Russia and Iran would ink their deal, which also requires Iran to return spent nuclear fuel to Russia, during a visit to Tehran late next month.

"The United States has criticized us and will continue to criticize us," Rumyantsev said.

"They say Iran seeks nuclear weapons under the cover of our peaceful technology transfer, but we keep telling them they've got that wrong," he said.

Some Western diplomats sharply disagreed with Russia's stance on Iran, which they said was still not cooperating with the UN watchdog agency.

One Western diplomat said the discovery of designs for gas centrifuges was not the result of Iranian cooperation but "good inspection work by the IAEA."

He said Iran only admitted it had the designs after the IAEA showed evidence it knew it had them.

The blueprints in question are based on the so-called "G2" centrifuge, developed by the British-German-Dutch consortium Urenco. But there were no indications that Urenco, which denied selling technology to Iran, provided the designs.

Pakistan known to have both the G1 and G2. Diplomats said they would not be surprised if they came from Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's atom bomb.