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Iran Halts Enrichment Activities
Iran today followed through on its pledge to halt uranium enrichment work in advance of an International Atomic Energy Agency Board of Governors meeting beginning Thursday. The board meeting could involve U.S. efforts to refer Tehran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions (see GSN, Nov. 19). “I think pretty much everything has come to a halt right now,” IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei said. “We’re just trying to apply seals and make sure everything has been stopped,” he said, specifying that operations at the uranium conversion facility at the central Iranian city of Isfahan were suspended. The suspension should be verified by Thursday, ElBaradei said, according to Agence France-Presse (Agence France-Presse/SpaceWar.com, Nov. 22). ElBaradei also confirmed today that Iran had produced around 2 tons of uranium hexafluoride, an allegation by Western diplomats that Iran had previously denied. Two tons would not be enough material to produce a nuclear weapon, he said (Louis Charbonneau, Reuters, Nov. 22). A U.S. State Department official and a senior administration official had charged Friday that Iran was accelerating its conversion of uranium ore into uranium hexafluoride gas before today’s suspension deadline at a facility in Isfahan, Knight Ridder reported The State Department official said Iranian officials are likely to argue that their agreement with the United Kingdom, France and Germany did not prohibit that process because the agreement was set to take effect today. “Technically, it may not, but it violates the spirit profoundly,” the official said. “It’s absolutely unacceptable. It’s a tremendous show of bad faith by Iran.” The alleged conversion work “only heighten[s] our concerns that Iran continues to pursue nuclear activities and does not honor its commitments,” said State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli. Ereli also said the United States stood by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell’s assertions Wednesday that Iran was developing delivery systems for nuclear warheads. “We believe we are on very, very solid ground in pointing to a clandestine effort by Iran to develop weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems,” Ereli said. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi denied the allegations, saying, “There is no place for weapons of mass destruction in Iran’s defense doctrine.” U.S. officials should “reconsider their intelligence sources,” he said. U.S. experts were working to verify the information, the State Department official and the senior administration official told Knight Ridder (Jonathan Landay, Knight Ridder/Kansas City Star, Nov. 20). Powell himself yesterday defended his allegations. “The people who are raising the questions are people who have not seen the information,” Powell said (Agence France-Presse/IranMania.com, Nov. 21). Iranian officials yesterday said Powell’s imminent departure from the Bush administration meant there was no point for him to meet with Iranian officials on the sidelines of an international conference on Iraq beginning today at the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, AFP reported. “Powell had four years to change the attitude of the United States towards Iran but he didn’t. Now he is not in charge anymore, and it would not be very useful to meet him,” Asefi said (Agence France-Presse/Khaleej Times, Nov. 21). U.S. President George W. Bush, in Chile for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, warned Iran Saturday following reports that it had accelerated some uranium enrichment activities, AFP reported. “It’s very important for the Iranian government to hear that we are concerned about their desires, and we’re concerned about reports that show that prior to a certain international meeting, they’re willing to speed up processing of materials that could lead to a nuclear weapon,” Bush said. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the issue later at the meeting. Putin “is on the same page as far as the goal is concerned,” said a senior Bush aide. “They both agree that they need to maintain the pressure on Iran and that, clearly, both agree that a nuclear Iran is not in our interests; we need to work to prevent that from happening,” the official said. The official clarified that Russia’s opposition is to a nuclear weapons program; Russia built the Bushehr reactor for Iran (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, Nov. 20). Elsewhere, Israeli officials blasted Iran and the European powers over the nuclear situation. “The Iranians have once again indulged in state lies. They have no intention of halting their nuclear program, which will continue in secret,” a senior Foreign Ministry official told AFP. “Like the Europeans and Americans, we have precise information on a network of secret installations where Iranians will continue to enrich uranium. Only known sites have been inspected,” said an aide to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. “The Europeans don’t seem to understand the danger they face — the Iranians have given notice they intend to add to their arsenal long-range missiles that can carry nuclear warheads and will threaten London, Paris or Berlin in a few years,” the aide added (Agence France-Presse/SpaceWar.com, Nov. 21). Meanwhile, IAEA ambassadors from Malaysia, Cuba, South Africa and Algeria left Friday for talks in Tehran, Malaysian Ambassador Hussein Haniff told AFP. Haniff said he saw no reason to refer Iran to the Security Council. “Iran honored the resolution from the last board meeting. When the resolution is honored, why should we refer Iran to the Security Council,” he said. The ambassadors were expected to return to Vienna early today, according to Haniff (Agence France-Presse/SpaceWar.com, Nov. 19).
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