Iran threatens to pull out of nuclear treaty

The Iranian parliament today threatened to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty if the US continued pressuring Tehran to suspend uranium enrichment.

The warning, in a letter to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, read on state radio, said Annan and the Security Council must resolve the dispute over Iran’s nuclear programme “peacefully, (or) there will be no option for the parliament but to ask the government to withdraw its signature” from an addendum to the treaty that calls for signers to allow intrusive, snap inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency – the treaty monitoring body.