U.S Expresses Alarm About Suspected Nuclear-Weapons Related Site
Sep 16, 2004
By George Jahn
Associated Press Writer
VIENNA, Austria (AP) - A U.S. official expressed alarm Thursday about a possible nuclear-weapons-related test site in Iran and accused the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency of keeping silent on its own concerns about the issue.
The official spoke as U.S. and European negotiators at a key meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency moved closer to agreement on censuring Iran for reneging on a freeze on uranium enrichment, and to setting a deadline for Tehran to dispel suspicions it is trying to make nuclear arms.
The official, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said the United States was suspicious that Iran's Parchin complex, southeast of the capital, is being used by the Islamic Republic to test high explosives, possibly with applications to nuclear weapons.
"This is a serious omission," on the part of IAEA director general Mohamed ElBaradei, said the official, alluding to the lack of specific mention on Parchin in a report written for the board by ElBaradei on the status of an inquiry into Iran's nuclear activities.
The official said the United States would "go to the other board members" and make sure the suspicious site is considered in any Iran resolution submitted to the board meeting.
Iran said the suspicions were false.
"Parchin has nothing to do with nuclear-related activities," said Hossein Mousavian, Tehran's chief delegate to the Vienna board meeting.
He denied reports that the IAEA had asked to visit the site, but said agency inspectors could do so if they wanted.
"Iran is fully prepared for cooperation" on Parchin, he told the AP.
A diplomat who follows the agency said there was an oblique, one-paragraph allusion to Parchin in the ElBaradei report.
"The agency has discussed with the Iranian authorities ... information relating to dual use equipment and materials which have applications in the conventional military area and in the civilian sphere as well as in the nuclear military area," the paragraph reads.
The IAEA rejected suggestions the agency willfully omitted sensitive information as "totally baseless ... (and) not worthy of further comment." Spokesman Mark Gwozdecky said the ElBaradei report "reflects the facts in an objective manner, and we fully stand by them."
A diplomat familiar with the agency's thinking said Parchin was not specifically listed as a concern because the IAEA did not have enough evidence to do so but also so as not to jeopardize future investigations into the site.
Still, the revelations on Parchin were likely to be used by Washington to push its case for tough Iran resolution.
A version Thursday - made available in full to the AP - showed the two sides agreed Iran must halt all uranium enrichment, but that negotiations on language and other demands continue.
The draft expressed "serious concern" that Iran "has not heeded repeated calls from the board to suspend ... all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities." And it expressed alarm at Iranian plans to process more than 40 tons of raw uranium into uranium hexafluoride, the feed stock for enrichment.
It also urged Iran to suspend all such activities; called on ElBaradei to submit a report by November reviewing the past two years of his Iran inquiry, and demanded Iran "resolve all outstanding issues and inconsistencies" feeding fears it may have a weapons program.
A proposal in the draft submitted by the United States, Canada and Australia would also set an Oct. 31 deadline for Iran to meet all the conditions. While no punitive action is directly threatened should it fail to do so, one Western diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity described the date as an "indirect trigger" that could open the way for referral of Iran to the U.N. Security Council.
The United States is seeking European support for Security Council action if Tehran defies the call for an enrichment freeze and other demands.
Iran is not prohibited from enrichment under its obligations to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. But it has faced mounting international pressure to suspend such activities, which can produce uranium for generating power or making nuclear weapons, as a good-faith gesture to prove it is not seeking to make atomic weapons.
The IAEA meeting adjourned Wednesday to allow for back-room negotiations and consultations with capitals. Plans were to reconvene Friday for a vote on a final version of the Iran resolution.
Last week, Iran confirmed an IAEA report that it planned to convert more than 40 tons of raw uranium into uranium hexafluoride, the feed stock for enrichment.
Even before that, international concerns over Iran's nuclear program were growing, fueled by suspicions that Tehran had never really suspended enrichment activities, as it had pledged to do a year ago.
An IAEA report gave Iran some good marks for cooperating with the most recent phase of a two-year agency inquiry into the country's nearly 20-year-old covert nuclear program, which surfaced publicly only two years ago. But the report also said Iran must do more to banish all suspicions that it harbors nuclear weapons ambitions.
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On the Net:
IAEA: www.iaea.org
AP-ES-09-16-04 1211EDT
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