login
login
Image header Agence Europe
Europe Daily Bulletin No. 8946
THE DAY IN POLITICS / (eu) eu/iran/nuclear

Tension mounts between Europeans and Iranians

Brussels, 12/05/2005 (Agence Europe) - After Iran's announcement on Thursday that resumption of its uranium conversion activities, a stage prior to uranium enrichment, was imminent, Berlin, London and Paris cautioned Teheran against resuming its nuclear enrichment activities, suspended since the Paris agreement last November. “We shall certainly take the matter to the Security Council if Teheran does not keep its commitments”, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said. The French foreign minister, Michel Barnier, urged Iran not to make such a gesture as it is “aware of the consequences”. According to the vice-president of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation, Gholam Rez Aghazadeh, Iran intends to resume a “substantial part” of its uranium conversion programme in installations in Ispahan, the exact date of resumption being “announced in the very near future”. Diplomatic sources at the seat of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna have stated that the EU-3 (Germany, France and the United Kingdom), which is negotiating on behalf of the EU, has warned Teheran that it would consider any recommencement of enrichment activities as a breach of the Paris agreement and that it would therefore have no choice but to give its backing to referral to the United Nations Security Council. Berlin, London and Paris have, moreover, already begun informal talks with the IAEA with a view to convening an extraordinary meeting of the Governing Council if Iran breaks the seals placed by the IAEA on uranium conversion equipment at the Ispahan plant.

Contents

A LOOK BEHIND THE NEWS
THE DAY IN POLITICS
GENERAL NEWS