Iran stalls over nuclear limit deal
Iran turned down a key deal aimed at easing Western fears over its nuclear ambitions today.
Instead of the UN plan that would see most of the country’s uranium being sent abroad for enrichment, it wants to buy in the nuclear fuel it needs for a reactor that makes medical isotopes.
The UN scheme would have meant it had enough nuclear materials for research but not sufficient for a bomb.
The response will come as a disappointment to the US, Russia and France, which endorsed the UN plan today.
While Iran did not reject the plan outright, state TV said that it was waiting for a response to its own proposal to buy nuclear fuel rather than send low-enriched uranium to Russia for further enrichment. Iran has often used counterproposals as a way to draw out nuclear negotiations with the West.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran is waiting for a constructive and confidence building response to the clear proposal of buying fuel for the Tehran research reactor,” state TV quoted an unnamed source close to Iran’s negotiating team.
Iranian opposition to the UN plan could be driven by concerns that it weakens Iran’s control over its stockpiles of nuclear fuel and could be perceived as a concession to the US, which suspects Iran is using its nuclear programme as a way to covertly develop weapons – an allegation denied by Tehran.
An unnamed member of Iran’s negotiating team urged world powers today to “refrain from past mistakes in violating agreements and make efforts to win the trust of the Iranian nation,” according to state TV.
President Barack Obama has stepped up diplomatic engagement with Iran since he took office in January and has criticised the Bush administration for refusing to talk to US adversaries. But he has also threatened harsher sanctions if Iran does not cooperate to ease fears about the nature of its nuclear programme.
The UN Security Council has already passed three sets of sanctions against Iran for failing to suspend uranium enrichment, but the US faces a serious challenge in convincing Russia and China to go even further because of their close ties to Tehran.
The draft UN agreement was formalised on Wednesday after three days of discussions in Vienna. The talks followed a similar meeting at the beginning of October in Geneva that included the highest-level bilateral contact between the US and Iran in years.
Iran is currently enriching uranium to a 3.5 percent level for a nuclear power plant it is planning to build in south-western Iran. Iranian officials have said it is more economical to purchase the more highly-enriched uranium needed for the Tehran reactor than produce it domestically.
The Vienna-brokered plan would have required Iran to send 1.2 tons of low-enriched uranium – around 70 percent of its stockpile – to Russia in one batch by the end of the year.
After further enrichment in Russia, France would have converted the uranium into fuel rods that would be returned to Iran for use in the Tehran reactor, he said.
Iran agreeing to ship most of its enriched uranium abroad would significantly ease fears about Tehran’s nuclear programme, since 2,205 pounds is the commonly accepted amount of low-enriched uranium needed to produce weapons-grade uranium for a single nuclear bomb.
Based on the present Iranian stockpile, the US has estimated that Tehran could produce a nuclear weapon between 2010 and 2015.
