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Tehran's nuclear technology peaceful, says Khatami
Jordan Times, Sunday, August 31, 2003
TEHRAN (Reuters) — EU foreign and security policy chief Javier Solana urged Iran on Saturday to sign up for tougher inspections of its nuclear programme to keep good relations with the 15-nation bloc, but Iran said it wouldn't yield to pressure. Iran faces mounting demands it sign the so-called Additional Protocol and allow short-notice inspections of its facilities, which the United States says are used to develop nuclear weapons. Iran denies the charge. The EU has pursued a policy of dialogue with Iran, including holding several rounds of talks on a possible trade pact. But EU officials have said Iranian agreement to enhanced inspections is a key demand for trade talks to progress.
"If you don't sign the Additional Protocol, it will be bad for you and, second, bad for us," Solana told a news conference in Tehran with Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi.
Asked what Iran would get in return for signing, Solana said: "The only thing you have to expect is we continue working as friends." President Mohammad Khatami told Solana during a meeting that Iran had an absolute right to peaceful nuclear technology.
"We are trying to build the confidence of those who have real concerns but we will not yield to political force," the student news agency ISNA reported him as saying.
"Atomic weapons have no place in Iran's defence policy," Khatami added. Iran said this week it was ready to start talks with the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), to allow inspectors more access to nuclear facilities, but Tehran also said it wanted some clarifications regarding its sovereignty, a reservation some analysts fear may cause delays.
The IAEA said in a report obtained by Reuters on Tuesday that Iran had improved cooperation, but there were still questions about weapons-grade uranium found at a site in Iran.
"If that process of enrichment has taken place, this has nothing do with a programme for peaceful use of nuclear fuel," Solana told reporters. Kharrazi repeated Iran's stance that contaminated imported equipment was to blame for the enriched particles. He also said it should be left up to the IAEA, whose governors meet in early September to discuss the Iran report, to judge.
In July, the EU issued its strongest warning so far to Iran about its nuclear programme and human rights, and said it would review relations in September in the light of Iran's behaviour.
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| Earth, a planet hungry for peace |
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| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03). |
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| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03). |
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