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Iran Wants to Continue Nuclear Negotiations with EU
Iran wants nuclear negotiations with the European Union to continue, the country’s chief delegate to the International Atomic Energy Agency said today (see GSN, Aug. 8). He added that an Iranian proposal to end the nuclear standoff was “still on the table.” “We can negotiate with the Europeans on the basis of that proposal,” said Naseri (Reuters/Yahoo!News, Aug. 9). IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei confirmed today that Iran has resumed feeding uranium ore into the first part of the process line at its Isfahan facility. “I have reported to the board that yesterday Iran started to introduce feed material into the conversion plant, essentially, unraveling the suspension with respect to the Isfahan nuclear facility. I will deliberate with the board and see how the board would react to that,” ElBaradei said before the meeting. Monitoring cameras were installed at the input stage, but conversion work began before inspectors were able to test the cameras, which normally takes 24 hours, according to an agency press statement (International Atomic Energy Agency release, Aug. 9). Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said today he had new ideas to present in nuclear negotiations with the European Union. “I will put forward initiatives in this respect after forming my Cabinet,” Ahmadinejad told U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan by telephone. Ahmadinejad called the EU proposal presented Friday “an insult to the Iranian nation.” “They have talked to us ... as if the Iranian nation was suffering from backwardness and the time was 100 years ago and our country was their colony,” he said. He reiterated Tehran’s stance that it was entitled to resume its nuclear work. “It is our national right to have such technology and nothing unlawful or unilateral has taken place,” he said (Paul Hughes, Reuters, Aug. 9). Tehran will not be deterred by international pressure over its nuclear program, a senior Iranian official said yesterday. “Should we accept humiliation, the sanctions, see ourselves be punished, or should we resist? I think that we should resist,” said Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani. “What are they going to do at the [U.N.] Security Council, impose sanctions on us? Sanctions have already been imposed on us,” Shamkhani said. He added that Security Council referral was unlikely to occur soon. “It is not as though they are going to send us tomorrow to the Security Council,” he said. Shamkhani argued that Iran’s nuclear program is peaceful, but added that “if one day our nuclear installations are attacked we will put aside all our nuclear engagements” (Agence France-Presse/Interactive Investor, Aug. 9). Washington announced yesterday it remained hopeful that the European Union’s diplomatic effort would continue, Agence France-Presse reported. “We’ll continue to work with the EU-3 in support of efforts to get this process back on track,” said State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli. A senior U.S. official confirmed that Washington preferred the diplomatic process continue rather than sending the matter to the Security Council. “We’re not ready to give up yet,” said the official. “Let’s see if we can’t put this genie back in the bottle. We’re going to be looking at ways with the Europeans, I think, to see if we can’t walk that back a little bit from the Iranians,” he said (Agence France-Presse/SpaceWar.com, Aug. 8). Tehran has built about 4,000 uranium enrichment centrifuges without disclosing the move to international inspectors, an exiled Iranian dissident said today. The centrifuges are ready to be installed at the Natanz facility, Alireza Jafarzadeh of Strategic Policy Consulting told the Associated Press. Jafarzadeh said he acquired the information from sources within the Iranian government who have provided accurate intelligence in the past. The International Atomic Energy Agency previously said it knew of only 164 centrifuges at Natanz, according to AP. “These 4,000 centrifuge machines have not been declared to the IAEA, and the regime has kept the production of these machines hidden from the inspectors while the negotiations with the European Union have been going on over the past 21 months,” Jafarzadeh said. He added that structural work in preparation for the centrifuge installation has continued in recent months at the Natanz facility. He said Iran was using front companies such as Pars Tarash, Kala Electric and Energy Novin to produce and test centrifuge parts. He said the companies maintained offices in the same downtown Tehran building that houses Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization (William Kole, Associated Press/ABCNews.com, Aug. 9).
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