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Middle East

IRAN TO RESUME URANIUM ENRICHMENT

Associated Press
May 1, 2005

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1114827623623

Iran said Saturday it is likely to resume uranium enrichment-related activities, a process it halted last year to build confidence in negotiations with European countries and avoid U.N. Security Council referral for possible sanctions.

Tehran's announcement came a day after talks in London with European negotiators yielded no results.

France, Britain and Germany, acting on behalf of the 25-nation European Union, are seeking guarantees Iran will not use its nuclear program to make weapons, as Washington suspects.

Top Iranian nuclear negotiator Hasan Rowhani was quoted as saying Tehran expects to restart enrichment activities -- injecting uranium gas into centrifuges -- at its uranium conversion facility in Isfahan.

"It's unlikely that uranium enrichment . . . which takes place in Natanz, will be resumed, but it's likely that some activities at Isfahan Uranium Conversion Facility will restart next week," IRNA quoted Rowhani as saying.

The central cities of Natanz and Isfahan house the heart of Iran's nuclear program. The Isfahan conversion facility reprocesses uranium ore concentrate into gas, which is then taken to Natanz and fed into the centrifuges for enrichment.

In Vienna, a senior diplomat close to the International Atomic Energy Agency said the U.N. nuclear watchdog had not been informed as of Saturday afternoon of Tehran's intention. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity.

The Europeans want Iran to permanently abandon enrichment, a process that can produce nuclear reactor fuel and, taken to a higher level, material for bombs. In return, Iran is being offered economic aid, technical support and backing for Iran's efforts to join mainstream international organizations.

Washington last month agreed to support the EU effort, but signaled Iran should quickly accept or face harsh U.N. Security Council sanctions. Iran insists its nuclear program is entirely peaceful and for generating electricity.

Iran says its November decision to suspend uranium enrichment-related activities was voluntary, temporary and not permanent, claiming it has a right to perform such activities under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

The Islamic republic has also warned that the talks with the Europeans would collapse if they don't yield results soon. Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi warned Thursday that "we will have no choice but to restart the uranium enrichment program."

Rowhani called the London talks "perhaps the last opportunity" for an agreement and acknowledged Iran and the Europeans had failed to achieve a compromise.

"The Europeans still insist on having more time to review the details of the plan (presented by Iran)," IRNA quoted him as saying.

Rowhani said Iran may also reveal details of its plan that provides legal, political and technical guarantees that its nuclear fuel activities will remain peaceful. Restarting some nuclear activities does not mean Iran will end negotiations with the Europeans, he added.

"Iran will continue talks and will keep its contacts with Europe," he said. U.S. efforts to refer Iran to the Security Council were "meaningless," he added without elaborating.

Hossein Shariatmadari, a senior hard-liner and a close associate of Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, urged his government to immediately pull out of the talks and resume all nuclear activities.

"From now on, giving an opportunity to the Europeans is waste of time and it will seriously damage the prestige of Islamic Iran," Shariatmadari said in an editorial in his hard-line newspaper Kayhan. "The prestige of our establishment requires ending the talks and resuming uranium enrichment."

On Friday, a senior British Foreign Office official said both sides had agreed to reflect on what they had discussed in the latest round and that talks would continue.

Meanwhile, two top German magazines reported a German company is under suspicion of selling weapons technology to Iran for use in its Shahab, or Shooting Star, medium-range missile program. The missile can carry a nuclear warhead and reach Israel and various U.S. military bases in the Middle East.

Der Spiegel said the firm is suspected of delivering rocket-building technology to Iran as far back as 2002. Focus weekly magazine identified the company as Tira and said its deliveries were intercepted by the intelligence agents of an ally in late 2004 in the Mideast emirate of Dubai.

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IRAN PLANS TO DEFY WEST AND RESTART NUCLEAR PROGRAM
By Ali Akbar Dareini

Scotsman
May 1, 2005

http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=466132005

Iran is planning to resume its uranium enrichment program this week after negotiations with the EU ended without a deal.

The warning sets up a summer crisis in Iran’s long-running nuclear dispute with the West and is likely to lead to heightened U.S. pressure to send its case to the United Nations Security Council for possible sanctions.

France, Britain and Germany have been negotiating with Iran, seeking guarantees that it will not use its nuclear program to make weapons, as Washington suspects. Tehran insists the program -- kept secret for two decades -- is only for energy purposes.

Iran agreed in November to temporarily freeze uranium enrichment, but insists the move is temporary. It has argued that the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, of which it is part, allows it to pursue a peaceful nuclear program, including enriching uranium.

Uranium enriched to low levels can be used as fuel in nuclear reactors to generate electricity, but further enrichment makes it suitable for use in nuclear weapons.

Iran’s top nuclear negotiator Hasan Rowhani said yesterday that it was unlikely that Tehran will resume actual uranium enrichment -- injecting uranium gas into centrifuges -- but that it expects to restart activities at its uranium conversion facility in Isfahan.

"It’s unlikely that uranium enrichment . . . which takes place in Natanz, will be resumed, but it’s likely that some activities at Isfahan Uranium Conversion Facility will restart next week," he said.

Rowhani called the talks with the EU in London that ended on Friday "perhaps the last opportunity" for an agreement. However, all sides are due to meet again on Tuesday in New York.

The European countries want Tehran to abandon its enrichment activities permanently in exchange for economic aid, technical support and backing for Iran’s efforts to join mainstream international organisations. The United States last month agreed to support the EU diplomatic effort, but signalled Iran should quickly accept or face the threat of harsh U.N. Security Council sanctions.

The EU has warned Tehran it will back U.S. calls for Iran’s nuclear case to be sent to the Security Council if it resumes enrichment.

Diplomats say Tehran has made a proposal to continue with its nuclear fuel-cycle work, including enrichment, but in gradual phases and under close international supervision.

The EU and Washington, however, say the only acceptable guarantee that Iran was not developing nuclear weapons would be for it to completely scrap all nuclear fuel work.

"Based on Iran’s proposal, all of Iran’s nuclear fuel-cycle activities will be peaceful and [the proposal] will provide security from legal and political perspectives," Rowhani said.

"Iran is completely prepared to give assurance to the world that its program is entirely peaceful."

Meanwhile, the U.S. is warning allies that North Korea could be ready to carry out an underground nuclear test as early as June. The information had been apparently gathered in part from satellite imagery.

The U.S. warnings reflect growing fears in Washington that North Korea is going ahead with efforts to develop nuclear weapons after South Korean officials said Pyongyang had recently shut down a nuclear reactor, possibly to harvest plutonium that could be used in an underground test.

The five-megawatt reactor at Yongbyon generates spent fuel rods laced with plutonium, but they must be removed and reprocessed to extract the plutonium for use in a nuclear weapon. They can be removed only if the reactor has been shut down.

North Korea restarted the reactor after expelling U.N. monitors at the end of 2002.

On Friday, U.S. assistant secretary of state Christopher Hill warned the communist state against conducting a nuclear test, saying such a move would be a "truly troubling" complication for suspended six-nation talks on halting Pyongyang’s nuclear program.

The U.S. believes North Korea has one or more nuclear weapons, and has untested missiles capable of reaching U.S. soil.