London meeting to respond to Tehran’s refusal to halt its nuclear programme
London (AsiaNews/Agencies) – The United Nations on Monday should finalise its position towards Iran on Monday after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) presented its report confirming that Iran has expanded rather than halted its nuclear fuel programme as it had requested. On that day the five members of the UN Security Council (United States, Russia, China, France and the United Kingdom) plus Germany, the so-called 5+1 group, are scheduled to meet in London.
In Paris, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) for its part revealed that a series of phoney companies—either phantom companies based at addresses of existing firms or existing companies under a new name—have been set up in Tehran for the purpose of pursuing Iran’s nuclear programme and sidestep existing UN sanctions.
Speaking in the French capital, NCRI’s spokesperson Afshin Alavi gave said that, for instance, Farayand Technique Co, one of the companies under UN sanctions, has changed its name to Technology of Centrifuge of Iran, Alavi said. Another company, Pars Trash Co, has become Rah Avard Kalaey Iran Co. Both have kept the same management.
The Iranian government has also set up five new firms—Tamin Tajhizat Sanayeh Hasteieh, Shakhes Behbood Sanaat Co., Mohandesi Toseh Sokht Atomi Co., Sookht Atomi Reactorhaye Iran and Modieriat Saakht Niroogahaye Atomi—to bust sanctions.
The six-page UN watchdog report stresses that Iran did not respect Security Council Resolution 1737, whose 60-day grace period ended yesterday, and stop enriching uranium. Instead, it has installed new centrifuge machines (which are used in the production of fuel) at its underground Natanz plant and its planning to install even more. For the IAEA this shows that Iran is well passed the research phase and into production.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today he was "deeply concerned" that Iran had not met the Security Council deadline to suspend uranium enrichment.
“I urge again that the Iranian Government fully comply with the Security Council as soon as possible” and engage in continued negotiation “with the international community so that we will be able to address and peacefully resolve this issue,” he said.
Albeit in varying degree of emphasis, the members of the 5+1 group has also called upon Iran to come back to the negotiating table. But the possibility the UN might impose new and harsher sanctions is limited at best due to Russian and Chinese opposition.
On the eve of the 5+1 meeting in London, Iranian Ambassador to the UK Rasoul Movahedian, quoted in Iran’s official news agency IRNA, said there was still a distinct possibility to find an agreed solution to the dispute over the country's nuclear program.
"If the present mindset can be replaced by a mentality of constructive interaction, a mutually acceptable outcome remains a real prospect," Movahedian said.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that access to nuclear know-how was key to Iran’s national development and that the country would never give up that right, IRNA reported.
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