Iran threatens to pull out of nuclear treaty

Iran has renewed its threats to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, with its president dismissing sanctions as “meaningless” and parliament seeking to end unannounced nuclear inspections.

The comments recalled the case of North Korea, which left the treaty in 2003. Last year Pyongyang declared it had nuclear weapons – unlike Tehran, which says its nuclear programme is only for generating electricity.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he would not hesitate to reconsider NPT membership, speaking as Washington and its allies pressed for a United Nations Security Council vote to suspend Tehran’s uranium enrichment programme.

“If a signature on an international treaty causes the rights of a nation be violated, that nation will reconsider its decision and that treaty will be invalid,” he told the official news agency IRNA.

Iran’s parliament made similar threats in a letter to UN secretary general Kofi Annan read on state-run radio, saying the dispute over Iran’s nuclear programme must be resolved “peacefully, (or) there will be no option for the parliament but to ask the government to withdraw its signature” from a protocol to the NPT allowing for snap inspections of its nuclear facilities.

The Iranian letter also said parliament might order Ahmadinejad’s government to review procedures for pulling out of the nuclear treaty, which signatories may do if they decide extraordinary events have jeopardised their “supreme interests”.

The US is backing attempts by Britain and France to win security council approval for a UN resolution that would threaten possible further measures if Iran does not suspend uranium enrichment – a process that can produce fuel for nuclear reactors to generate electricity or, if sufficiently processed, to make atomic weapons.

President George Bush, in an interview with ARD German television, said: “An armed Iran will be a threat to peace. It will be a threat to peace in the Middle East, it will create a sense of blackmail, it will encourage other nations to feel like they need to have a nuclear weapon. And so it’s essential that we succeed diplomatically.”

The Western nations want to invoke Chapter 7 of the UN Charter that would allow economic sanctions or military action, if necessary, to force Iran’s compliance. Russia and China, the other two permanent security council members - all of whom have veto power – oppose such moves.

The US ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, said yesterday he believed the resolution would move to a vote this week, with or without support from Moscow and Beijing. He dismissed the Iranian parliament’s threat, saying it would not deter a UN resolution.

“It shows they remain desperate to conceal that their nuclear programme is in fact a weapons programme,” he said.

North Korea agreed last September to give up its nuclear programme in exchange for US aid and security assurances, but negotiations have been stalled since November, mainly because of Pyongyang’s anger over US sanctions for alleged currency counterfeiting and money laundering.

North Korea escaped punishment by the security council, but Iran’s possible departure from the treaty is likely to bring a tougher response.

Ahmadinejad restated his readiness to jettison treaty membership, calling threats of sanctions “meaningless” and vowed to “smash their (US-backed) illegitimate resolutions against a wall”.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said any UN resolution would be “completely illegal” and driven by politics.

“It’s clear that any action by the UN Security Council will leave a negative impact on our co-operation with the IAEA,” he said, adding that such action would “change the path of co-operation to confrontation”.

The IAEA declared in 2002 that Iran had been conducting secret nuclear activities for decades, though it has never said Tehran has a weapons programme.

Iran claims it has the right to enrich uranium under its treaty membership, but its opponents claim it ceded that right by hiding parts of its nuclear programme from the international community.

In February, Iran barred intrusive inspections of its nuclear facilities by the IAEA after it was referred to the security council.