UNITED NATIONS — The International Atomic Energy Agency challenged Iran on Thursday to allow unfettered inspections of its nuclear facilities to disprove suspicions that they could be used to develop nuclear weapons. But Iran resisted, leaving the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency in a diplomatic quandary.
The agency's 35-member board ended a three-day debate Thursday with a statement rebuking Tehran's clandestine import, storage and processing of uranium in defiance of its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The agency also expressed concern, in a report presented this week, about Iran's revelations that it was building a heavy-water facility, which can be used to produce weapons-grade plutonium.
Although its statement fell short of the condemnation sought by the U.S., the board did encourage Tehran to accept an additional protocol that would permit full inspections of its nuclear activities. The statement also urged Iran to not put nuclear material into a pilot uranium-enrichment project at Natanz "as a confidence-building measure."
White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said President Bush welcomed the board's statement, adding that the world would be watching Iran's next move. "But if Iran is not pursuing nuclear weapons," Fleischer said, "why wouldn't they cooperate fully and completely with the IAEA?"
Bush had pushed for a harder line on Iran, which he has grouped with Iraq and North Korea as an "axis of evil." He said Wednesday that "the international community must come together to make it very clear to Iran that we will not tolerate construction of a nuclear weapon."
Iran's representative to the IAEA, Ali Salehi, told reporters in Vienna that he was pleased that the board did not bow to U.S. pressure, and he rejected the call for more stringent inspections. "The language of force and threat will be futile and not conducive to the achievement of our common goal," he said.
In Tehran, President Mohammad Khatami said that Iran was prepared to allow wider inspections by the nuclear agency -- but only if the international community recognized Iran's right to acquire advanced peaceful nuclear technology. In the meantime, Iran said it would go ahead with plans to enrich uranium, the next step in a process to produce either nuclear energy or material for nuclear weapons.
