Iran restarts nuclear work

[sonz]

Ignoring western pressure, Iran resumed on Tuesday nuclear researches it blocked for two-years, sparking Western condemnation and increasing risk of being referred to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions.

"Today, with the authorization given by the IAEA (the International Atomic Energy Agency) to its inspectors (to supervise the action) ... seals from a number of research centers were removed," Mohammad Saidi, deputy head of Iran's Atomic Energy Agency, told reporters on Tuesday.

"As of today these centers resume their activities," Saidi added. "The research will be carried out in all the centers that we told the IAEA about, and we will restart our work."

The U.S., backed by Israel, as well as the European Union claims that Iran is using its civilian NUCLEAR PROGRAM as a guise for developing a nuclear weapons program, and had been trying to lobby international support for its efforts to refer the Islamic Republic’s nuclear case to the UN Security Council.

The UN atomic watchdog on the other hand confirmed that its inspectors have permitted Iran remove seals at its Natanz atomic research facility, an underground plant in central Iran that Tehran concealed from UN inspectors until an Iranian exile group revealed its existence in 2002.

"The production of nuclear fuel is still in suspension and we hope to reach a conclusion over it in the near future, and also reach a clear agreement with the Europeans in this regard," Saidi said.

Meanwhile, the U.S. ambassador to the IAEA denounced the Islamic republic's "disdain for international concern".

"Today Iran is taking another deliberate step towards uranium enrichment, the process for creating nuclear bomb material," Gregory Schulte claimed in a statement.

"By cutting the seals, the Iranian leadership shows its disdain for international concern and its rejection of international diplomacy."

London is in contact with fellow EU members France and Germany and the three states’ foreign ministers are set to meet "to discuss next steps soon".

"This is a very negative development that will seriously jeopardize the negotiating process," a spokesman for the Foreign Office in London told AFP.

French President Jacques Chirac said Iran "would be committing a serious mistake if they did not take the hand that we are holding out to them".

But Russia, which is helping Iran build a nuclear power station at the southern port of Bushehr, stressed that dialogue was still the only way forward.

"It is cause for concern that Iran has announced an intention to restart work connected to enrichment of uranium in spite of a moratorium agreed between Iran and European countries," Interfax quoted Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov as saying by .

Russia "will make an effort to ensure that during the period of negotiations the moratorium (on enrichment itself) is maintained," he added.

Iran started its NUCLEAR PROGRAM in the Shah's era, including a plan to build 20 nuclear power reactors. Also research and development efforts were conducted by the Shah's regime on fissile material production, but these efforts were suspended during the Iranian revolution and the Iran-Iraq war.

It built two power reactors in Bushehr, on the coast of the Persian Gulf, but they remained unfinished when they were bombed and damaged during the Iran-Iraq war.

After the 1979 revolution, Iran suspended all its NUCLEAR ACTIVITIES but work was resumed on a somewhat more modest scale.