Iran will not retreat “one iota” from its nuclear program, but the world is being misled by claims that it seeks atomic weapons, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said yesterday in his first reaction since a UN watchdog report that Tehran is on the brink of developing a nuclear warhead.
The comments — broadcast live on state TV — contrasted sharply with Western warnings that Iran appears to be engaged in a dangerous defiance of international demands to control the Islamic Republic’s nuclear ambitions.
In Paris, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said his country would support boosting sanctions against Tehran to an “unprecedented scale” if Iran stonewalls investigations, even as Israel and others say that military options are still possible.
Israel’s government, however, remained silent over the report, apparently seeking to keep the focus on international pressures and avoid turning the report into a specific showdown between Israel and Iran.
Meanwhile, Iran’s chief allies, China and Russia, have issued cautious statements calling for diplomacy and dialogue.
“This nation won’t retreat one iota from the path it is taking,” Ahmadinejad told thousands of people in Shahr-e-Kord in central Iran. “Why are you ruining the prestige of the [UN nuclear] agency for absurd US claims?”
Ahmadinejad also strongly chided the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), saying it is discrediting itself by siding with “absurd” US accusations.
The 13-page annex to the IAEA’s report released on Tuesday included claims that while some of Iran’s activities have civilian as well as military applications, others are “specific to nuclear weapons.”
Among these were indications that Iran has conducted high explosives testing and detonator development to set off a nuclear charge, as well as computer modeling of a core of a nuclear warhead. The report also cited preparatory work for a nuclear weapons test and the development of a nuclear payload for Iran’s Shahab 3 intermediate-range missile — a weapon that can reach Israel.
Ahmadinejad repeated Iran’s claims that it does not make sense to build nuclear weapons in a world already awash with atomic arms.
“The Iranian nation is wise. It won’t build two bombs against 20,000 [nuclear] bombs you have, but it builds something you can’t respond to: Ethics, decency, monotheism and justice,” he said in comments apparently directed at the West and others.
The US and its allies claim a nuclear-armed Iran could touch off a nuclear arms race among rival states, including Saudi Arabia, and directly threaten Israel.
The West is seeking to use the report as leverage to possibly toughen sanctions on Iran, but Israel and others have said military options have not been ruled out.
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