From the Los Angeles Times

Iran reveals how it built nuclear program, U.N. says

Report says Tehran has been forthcoming but that many questions remain about its atomic activities. U.S. pushes for new sanctions.

By Maggie Farley
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

1:08 PM PST, November 15, 2007

UNITED NATIONS -- The U.N.'s nuclear watchdog said today that Iran had been mostly forthcoming about the history of its nuclear program but had left many questions about its current activities unanswered, leading the United States to push for new Security Council sanctions on the Persian Gulf nation.

The closely watched report by the International Atomic Energy Agency also noted that, in defiance of Security Council demands, Iran has not suspended uranium enrichment and continues construction on a heavy-water reactor. The agency also could not determine whether Tehran is seeking to develop nuclear weapons.

Iran's recent lack of transparency means that "the agency's knowledge about Iran's current nuclear program is diminishing," said IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei.

But in an assessment that will give weight to Iran's defenders on the Security Council, ElBaradei also noted that Iran had made "substantial progress" in revealing the extent of its past procurement efforts.

While Iran's cooperation had been "reactive rather than proactive," ElBaradei said, Tehran had answered questions about how it acquired black market nuclear technology during the two decades it developed its atomic program in secret.

The report was slightly more critical than expected but is a disappointment for diplomats who had hoped it would show either marked improvement in Tehran's cooperation or demonstrate a degree of recalcitrance that would convince China and Russia to join Britain, France and the U.S. in their drive for further penalties. The countries hold the five permanent seats on the Security Council.

At U.N. headquarters, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said that the council would move forward with a sanctions resolution, the third on Iran, though it would not abandon the diplomatic track.

"For diplomacy to succeed, it needs widely supported, broad and biting sanctions to affect the regime in Iran," he said. "I don't believe that China would want to take responsibility for the failure of diplomacy."

In Iran, chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili said the report showed that his government had been transparent in its dealings with the international community. But he hinted that Tehran would halt its cooperation if further sanctions were imposed. He criticized the U.S. for calling for another round of penalties even before the report came out.

"It shows that whatever is in the negotiations or IAEA report, America is following a policy of unilateralism and just wants to deprive Iran of her rights," he said.

Security Council members agreed three months ago to hold off on tougher penalties for Iran's refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, hoping to give ElBaradei time to assess whether Iran is trying to use its nuclear technology or materials to produce weapons. But without a clear-cut judgment about Iran's intentions, the council finds itself in the same position it has been in the last four years: unable to compel Iran to halt its nuclear program.

The United States, Britain and France circulated their own set of questions Wednesday in Vienna, home of the IAEA, about Iran's uranium enrichment program to highlight how much is unknown about the country's nuclear intentions, past and present.

"We have a whole range of outstanding questions about Iran's nuclear program," Britain's ambassador to the U.N., John Sawers, said Wednesday. "I think it is going to take a long time to clarify the history of this 20-year concealed program, and it's going to take even longer for the international community to restore its confidence that Iran's intentions are purely peaceful."

In an effort to show its cooperation, Iran last week handed over a long-withheld secret blueprint showing how to shape uranium metal into hemispheres for a nuclear warhead, diplomats said.

IAEA inspectors had discovered the document in 2005, but were only permitted to read it and not take it outside the country. Iran has claimed it was given unsolicited by Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, known as the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb, who secretly peddled nuclear technology to Iran, Iraq, North Korea and Libya.

Iranian officials said they did not ask for the blueprint and did not try to manufacture a weapon from the plans. Its handover was one of ElBaradei's demands as part of a plan that requires Iran to answer questions one by one about its clandestine nuclear development. ElBaradei said he hoped to finish the inquiry by the end of the year.

Iran also provided some information about P1 and P2 centrifuges designed to enrich uranium, said Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi after meeting with members of the British Parliament in London on Tuesday, but said the issue was under study.The P2 type, suspected to operate with technology provided by Khan, are more sophisticated and can refine uranium two or three times as fast as the P1.

Last week, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that a cascade of 3,000 centrifuges was operating and the country's nuclear program was "irreversible." If the cascade is functioning properly, at that rate the Iranians could enrich enough uranium for a bomb in about a year, scientists say, though U.S. intelligence estimates put Tehran between four and seven years away from constructing a complete weapon.

China and Russia's foreign ministers have both visited Tehran in the last two weeks to encourage cooperation with the IAEA. The two countries are key trade partners with Iran, and China has increased its commerce with the nation in the last few months.

Although both have voted for sanctions against Iran before and have agreed to prepare further penalties in case the IAEA and European Union reports are negative, Moscow and Beijing are expected to argue that sanctions would derail Iran's improved cooperation.

"As long as the process moves a bit forward, we should keep on this track," a Chinese diplomat said. "The main thing for the Security Council is to help the IAEA answer these outstanding questions, and we are not convinced that additional sanctions would help."