Iran Denies Smuggling Uranium from Monitored Site
Reuters
Date: 04-13-05
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran denied Wednesday a report that it may have secretly moved some sensitive nuclear material from a site being monitored by the U.N.'s atomic watchdog.
Diplomats told Reuters Tuesday that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was taking an inventory of processed uranium at the Isfahan uranium conversion facility in central Iran amid concerns some may have been moved.
The diplomats said one intelligence agency had accused Iran of spiriting an unspecified amount of processed uranium, which could be processed further and enriched for weapons purposes, out of Isfahan to an unknown location.
Iran says its nuclear program is exclusively for generating electricity, not making bombs.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi denied Iran had smuggled any uranium out of Isfahan.
"Our nuclear activities are transparent and under the supervision of the IAEA," the official IRNA news agency quoted him as saying.
"Iran seeks nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. It would be meaningless for Iran to smuggle" uranium from Isfahan, he added.
Iran agreed last November to freeze work at Isfahan and all other nuclear fuel-related activities while it tries to reach agreement with the European Union over the future of its nuclear program.
Diplomats say Britain, Germany and France, who are leading the EU talks with Iran, are currently considering an Iranian proposal to allow Tehran to keep a pilot uranium enrichment facility under IAEA supervision.
But Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Hassan Rohani on Wednesday denied that any limitations on Iran's nuclear program were being considered.
"The European countries have not set any limitations for Iran in the nuclear negotiations and it has not even been discussed," he told state television.
Rohani said Iran had met its side of the agreement reached with the EU trio in Paris last year.
"It's the European countries' turn to take more steps in this regard," he said.
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