Diplomats deadlocked on Iran nuclear program

Washington is insisting that the International Atomic Energy Agency declare Iran in "noncompliance" of the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and report to the UN Security Council, which could impose sanctions.

Britain, France, and Germany are pushing a softer line, and are trying to formalize a deal they made with Tehran last month in which Iran would be implicitly forgiven past transgressions if they agree to tougher and more comprehensive inspections and voluntarily suspend the enrichment of uranium that can be used to make nuclear bombs.

The talks over Iran's nuclear weapons program adjourned yesterday to allow diplomats on the 35-member IAEA board of governors to consult with their capitals. They will resume on Wednesday.

Many here view the talks as a precedent-setting case of how the international community will handle future cases of nuclear proliferation.

"Iran's breaches of its obligations have been brazen and systematic," Kenneth Brill, the US ambassador to the UN mission in Vienna, said in a speech to delegates. "How the IAEA deals with the discovery of so much of Iran's hitherto entirely secret nuclear program will be a critical watershed for the global nuclear nonproliferation regime."

Iran admitted in late October that it had failed to report experiments with enriched uranium and reprocessed plutonium to the IAEA, which according to diplomats here is a clear violation of the nonproliferation treaty. On Oct. 21, the foreign ministers of Germany, France, and Britain won key concessions from Iran, including an agreement to voluntarily suspend uranium enrichment and to allow more stringent, snap IAEA inspections.

Implicit in the agreement, officials here say, was a deal that Iran would neither be declared in noncompliance with the nonproliferation treaty nor reported to the Security Council.

The trans-Atlantic rift broke out publicly in Brussels earlier this week when Secretary of State Colin L. Powell expressed concern that a draft IAEA resolution circulated by Britain, Germany, and France was too weak and failed to declare Iran in violation of the nonproliferation treaty.

Several countries, including Canada, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, Spain, and the Netherlands, joined Washington in calling for a tougher resolution; and diplomats worked furiously this week to insert tougher language in the draft resolution.

By late Thursday night, diplomats said a deal was in the works that would say the IAEA "strongly deplores Iran's past breaches," but stopped short of sending the matter to the Security Council. But US officials said yesterday the language was not tough enough, and continued to insist that Iran be declared in noncompliance and brought before the council.

US officials argue that if Iran were allowed to get away without a finding of noncompliance, it would set a dangerous precedent.

"The rubber meets the road on the nonproliferation treaty right now at this meeting in Vienna," a US official said. "People are making calculations based on this, people in laboratories."

But Germany, France, and Britain are concerned that punishing Iran when it is beginning to cooperate and come clean on its nuclear program could cause Tehran to cease its new openness, and possibly even withdraw from the nonproliferation treaty.

Iran has been cooperating fully with the IAEA since its Oct. 21 agreement with the three European nations. But Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's representative to the IAEA, raised the stakes yesterday by suggesting that Tehran would not sign on to a tough new inspections regime if they were declared in noncompliance or reported to the Security Council. A Western diplomat said Iran was "trying to leverage everything they can" to influence the outcome of the talks.

"This is not surprising, but it isn't acceptable," Brill said after yesterday's meeting adjourned.

During yesterday's contentious meeting, Brill also sparred verbally with the IAEA director, Mohamed ElBaradei, over a report in which the agency said there was no evidence that Iran had a nuclear weapons program.

"It will take some time to overcome the damage to the agency's credibility by this highly unfortunate and misleading `no evidence' turn of phrase," Brill told delegates.