23 February 2007
The United States government is to push for new sanctions against Iran after the United Nations nuclear watchdog confirmed that Teheran has defied two UN Security Council resolutions and failed to stop enriching uranium. In a confidential report, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reports that Iran had "not suspended its enrichment-related activities'' by the UN-imposed deadline of 20 February. This process could produce the material essential to making a nuclear bomb. Instead, the report says that Iran installed two new cascades of 164 centrifuges in an underground enrichment plant while another two cascades are close to completion. This amounts to an effort to escalate research-level enrichment of nuclear fuel into "industrial scale'' production, the IAEA report states.
The US secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, said that world powers planned to refer Iran back to the UN Security Council in an attempt to halt its sensitive nuclear work and resume negotiations. Following a meeting in Berlin with her German and Russian counterparts, Frank Steinmeier and Sergey Lavrov, and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, Rice said there was agreement over the next steps to take: "We reconfirmed that we will use our available channels and the Security Council to achieve that goal and the goal is to get Iran back to negotiations once they suspend their enrichment activities," she said. "We have the common goal to encourage Iran back to the bargaining table."
Meanwhile, British prime minister Tony Blair said that he knew of no plans by the United States to attack Iran, and he stressed his commitment to finding a diplomatic solution. "I can't think that it would be right to take military action against Iran,'' he told BBC Radio 4."I think what is important is to pursue the political, diplomatic channel. I think it is the only way that we are going to get a sensible solution to the Iranian issue. I know of nobody in Washington that is planning for military action against Iran. You can't absolutely predict every set of circumstances that comes about, but Iran is not Iraq.''
Robert Gates, the US Defense secretary, has said he is opposed to military action against Iran. Iran has offered to open unconditional talks with the West, but America insists that uranium enrichment must stop, in accordance with UN Resolutions 1696 and 1737, before any negotiations can take place.
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