Iran upped the ante in its nuclear standoff with countries wanting to refer it to the UN Security Council, warning such action would lead Tehran to immediately forge ahead with developing a full-scale uranium enrichment program.
The message, delivered on Monday by Ali Asghar Soltaniyeh, Iran's senior envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), reflected Tehran's defiance in the face of growing international pressure over its nuclear program. Enrichment can be used in electricity production, but it is also a pathway to making nuclear weapons.
Deadline approaching
High-level international diplomacy intensified with little more than a week to go until Feb. 2 -- when the IAEA's 35-nation board meets to decide on referral.
Iran's top nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, planned to travel to Moscow yesterday for a high-level session on a proposal to have Iran's uranium enriched in Russia, then returned to Iran for use in the country's reactors -- a compromise that would provide more oversight and ease tensions.
A European official said the two sides would discuss a possible additional refinement -- allowing Iran to conduct small-scale experimental enrichment on its own soil if it agreed to move all industrial production to Russia.
The official, who demanded anonymity in exchange for discussing confidential details of the negotiations, refused to say whether Britain, France and Germany -- the key European nations behind the US-supported push for referral -- would tolerate such a deal.
Those European nations and EU representatives also intensified diplomatic efforts, with diplomats saying they were sending senior representatives to Brazil, Russia, China and Indonesia to persuade these key IAEA board members to drop their opposition to referral.
Courting support
While the Europeans believe they have enough votes to get Iran hauled before the council on Feb. 2, they want broad support, including from key developing countries as well as skeptics Russia and China.
In Washington, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said "referral absolutely has to be made" on Feb. 2, while remaining vague on what action the Security Council would take -- and when.
Ending a 15-month commitment, Iran removed IAEA seals from equipment on Jan. 10 and announced it would restart experiments, including what it described as small-scale enrichment -- a move that led the so-called "EU-3" to call for the Feb. 2 emergency board session.
The Europeans also began drafting a basic text for a resolution calling for the Security Council to press Tehran to re-impose its total freeze on enrichment and fully cooperate with the UN agency in its investigation of suspect nuclear activities -- though it stops short of asking the council to impose sanctions.
Soltaniyeh, in comments to the AP, warned against referral, suggesting such a "hasty decision" would backfire.
Whether Iran's suspension of its full-scale enrichment program remains in effect "depends on the decision of Feb. 2," he said. Asked if that meant Iran would resume efforts to fully develop its nascent enrichment activities if the board votes for referral at that meeting, he said, ``yes.''
Iran insists its nuclear ambitions do not go beyond wanting to generate fuel, but concerns are growing its main focus is trying to make nuclear weapons -- something more than three years of IAEA investigations have failed to prove or disprove.
‘ABSURD MISTAKE’: The election commission said that there had been a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations ran short of ballot papers South Korean riot police yesterday cleared protesters from a Seoul polling station after a 35-hour blockade sparked by a shortage of ballot papers during local elections earlier this week. Wednesday’s election was the first nationwide vote since South Korean President Lee Jae-myung took office following the ouster of Yoon Suk-yeol over his short-lived martial law declaration. Lee’s ruling Democratic Party swept most races, but failed to flip the crucial Seoul mayoral seat. The South Korean National Election Commission apologized, blaming a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations in Seoul ran short of ballot papers. Some polling stations stayed open until 10pm to
France experienced its hottest spring on record, the French weather service said on Tuesday, after an exceptional early heat wave that also broke highs for the season in England and Wales. Meteo-France said the average nationwide temperature over March to May was 13.8°C — about 1.7°C above the norm, and surpassing records set in 2011 and 2020. “The warmest spring since records began in 1900,” it said in a bulletin. All three months were warmer than average, but the onset of an “unprecedented heatwave” late last month pushed the mercury to highs typically seen at the height of the summer. “Our country had never
A Sherpa guide was found crawling to base camp on Mount Everest a week after he went missing and was reunited with his family, who had given up hope he would return. Dawa Sherpa was last seen on Friday last week descending the mountain, but he did not reach base camp even though his client did. The pair were among the last climbers on the mountain as the climbing season came to an end and the route was dismantled. Dawa was located by a cleaning crew on Thursday morning as he was crawling down the snowy slopes around the Khumbu Icefall, just above
Chinese authorities are snuffing out any remembrance of the deadly 1989 military crackdown on student-led pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square, which happened 37 years ago yesterday, in a further tightening of a years-long campaign to erase what happened from public memory. Police told relatives of the victims they would not be allowed to visit a cemetery in Beijing on the anniversary of the crackdown, a person with knowledge of the matter said. Relatives of the victims visited the cemetery on the anniversary for more than 30 years to read memorial statements with police keeping watch, Amnesty International said. Hundreds of people,
RSS