Iran nuclear research a 'serious concern'
UN report notes a lack of cooperation
PARIS - The International Atomic Energy Agency, in an unusually blunt and detailed report, said yesterday that Iran's suspected research into the development of nuclear weapons remained "a matter of serious concern" and continued to need "substantial explanations."
The nine-page report accused the Iranians of a willful lack of cooperation, particularly in answering allegations that its nuclear program may be pointed less at energy generation than at military use.
Part of the agency's case hinges on 18 documents listed in the report and presented to Iran that, according to Western intelligence agencies, indicate the Iranians have ventured into explosives, uranium processing, and a missile warhead design - activities that ordinarily would be associated with constructing nuclear weapons.
"There are certain parts of their nuclear program where the military seems to have played a role," said one senior official close to the agency, who spoke on condition of anonymity under normal diplomatic constraints. He added, "We want to understand why."
Iran has dismissed the documents as "forged" or "fabricated," said its experiments and projects had nothing to do with a nuclear weapons program, and refused to provide documentation and access to its scientists to support its position.
The report also makes the serious allegation that Iran is learning to make more powerful centrifuges that are operating faster and more efficiently, the product of robust research and development that have not been fully disclosed to the agency.
That means the country may be producing enriched uranium, which can be used to make electricity or to fuel bombs, faster than expected with a parallel program that could replace its older generation of less reliable centrifuges. Some of the centrifuge components have been produced by Iran's military, said the report, prepared by Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the agency, which is the UN nuclear monitor.
The report makes no effort to disguise the agency's frustration with Iran's lack of openness. It describes, for example, Iran's installation of new centrifuges, and other modifications at its site at Natanz, as "significant, and as such should have been communicated to the agency."
The agency also said that during a visit in April, it was denied access to sites where centrifuge components were being manufactured and where research of uranium enrichment was being conducted.
Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's ambassador to the Vienna-based atomic agency, however, said that the report vindicated Iran's nuclear activities. It "is another document that shows Iran's entire nuclear activities are peaceful," the semiofficial Fars News Agency quoted him as saying.
