UPDATE: Iran cries foul! Claims the U.S. is making stuff up, and that they are only interested in exploring clean energy alternatives for their country! And the IAEA is buying it!! Hooray, Iran really doesn't pose a threat to World Peace!
US intel links Iran with nuke bomb bid
By GEORGE JAHN, Associated Press Writer
Thu Feb 14, 10:21 AM ET
The U.S. has recently shared new intelligence with the International Atomic Energy Agency on key aspects of Iran's nuclear program that Washington says shows Tehran was directly engaged in trying to make a bomb, diplomats said Thursday.
[ERIC] Again, how effective is the IAEA?
One of the diplomats said Washington also gave the IAEA permission to confront Iran with at least some of the evidence in an attempt to pry details out of the Islamic republic, as part of the U.N. nuclear watchdog's attempts to investigate Iran's suspicious nuclear past.
The diplomats suggested that such moves by the U.S. administration would be a reflection of Washington's' drive to pressure Iran into acknowledging that it had focused part of its nuclear efforts toward developing a weapons program.
The U.S. is leading the push for a third set of U.N. sanctions against Iran. Tehran insists its program is intended only to produce energy and has refused U.N. demands that it suspend its uranium enrichment program — technology that can produce both fuel for nuclear reactors and the fissile material for a bomb.
A recent U.S. intelligence assessment that Iran had a clandestine weapons program but stopped working on it four years ago has hurt Washington's attempts to have the U.N. Security Council impose a third set of sanctions.
While the Americans have previously declassified and then forwarded intelligence to the IAEA to help its investigations, they do so on a selective basis.
Following Israel's bombing of a Syrian site late last year, and media reports citing unidentified U.S. officials as saying the target was a nuclear installation, IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei turned in vain to the U.S. in asking for details on what was struck, said a diplomat who — like others — spoke on condition of anonymity in exchange for divulging confidential information.
Over the past two years, the U.S. already has shared material on a laptop computer reportedly smuggled out of Iran. In 2005, U.S. intelligence assessed that information as indicating that Tehran had been working on details of nuclear weapons, including missile trajectories and ideal altitudes for exploding warheads.
[ERIC]: Why would these details be worked out if they are only enriching Uranium for fuel?
After declassification, U.S. intelligence also was forwarded on two other issues: the "Green Salt Project" — a plan the U.S. alleges links diverse components of a nuclear weapons program, including uranium enrichment, high explosives testing and a missile re-entry vehicle — and material in Iran's possession showing how to mold uranium metal into warhead form.
Two of the diplomats said the material forwarded to the IAEA over the past two weeks expanded on the previous information from the Americans, but had no additional details.
Iran is already under two sets of U.N. Security Council sanctions for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment, which it started developing during nearly two decades of covert nuclear activity built on illicit purchases and revealed only five years ago.
Since then, IAEA experts have uncovered activities, experiments, and blueprints and materials that point to possible efforts by Iran to create nuclear weapons, even though Tehran insists its nuclear project is peaceful and aimed only at creating a large-scale enrichment facility to make reactor fuel.
Its leaders consistently dismiss allegations that they are interested in enrichment for its other use — creating fissile material suitable for arming warheads.
Instead of heeding Security Council demands to freeze enrichment, Iran has expanded its program. On Wednesday, diplomats told the AP that Iran's new generation of advanced centrifuges have begun processing small quantities of the gas that can be used to make the fissile core of nuclear warheads.
[ERIC]: Pretty dramatic way to end the article. My question is, what will Obama do when he is elected?
Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.
IAEA: Iran disputes atomic arms evidence
By GEORGE JAHN, Associated Press WriterFri Feb 22, 6:20 PM ET
The U.N. nuclear watchdog said Friday that Iran is defying a U.N. Security Council ban on uranium enrichment and accusing the U.S. and its allies of fabricating information to back up claims that Tehran is making nuclear weapons.
[ERIC]: And what is the IAEA's response? Read on ...
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said there was a "very strong case" for moving forward with a third round of sanctions against Tehran, while Iran said the report's findings confirmed that its nuclear program is a peaceful one.
"There is very good reason after this report to proceed to the third Security Council resolution," Rice said, adding that the report "demonstrates that whatever the Iranians may be doing to try to clean up some elements of the past, it is inadequate."
The 11-page report obtained by The Associated Press said Iran "has not suspended its enrichment-related activities," despite two sets of U.N. Security Council sanctions over fears the program might be used to make weapons-grade uranium instead of the nuclear fuel Iran says it is interested in.
Instead, said the report, Iran "started the development of new-generation centrifuges" — an expansion of enrichment — and continued working on heavy water nuclear facilities. When finished, Iran could cull them for plutonium, a possible fissile payload in nuclear warheads.
At the same time, the International Atomic Energy Agency report said that Tehran has cooperated in other areas of an IAEA probe, leading the agency to put to rest for now suspicions that several past experiments and activities were linked to a weapons program.
[ERIC]: Woo-hoo!! That is FANTASTIC news! The IAEA declares that Iran is not really in the process of building nuclear weapons! I can sleep easier now that I know this.
Specifically, the report suggested the agency was satisfied with answers provided by Iran on the origin of traces of enriched uranium in a military facility; on experiments with polonium, which can also be used in a weapons program; and on purchases on the nuclear black market.
[ERIC]: Dude, I am at a loss for words on this one ...
It said that in those areas information given by Tehran is either "consistent with its findings (or) ... not inconsistent with its findings," suggesting it was content for now with explanations that these activities were not weapons-related.
Iran's U.N. Ambassador Mohammad Khazee said the report "clearly attests to the exclusively peaceful nature of the nuclear program of the Islamic Republic of Iran, both in the past and at present."
The report "also serves to strongly and unambiguously support my country's long-standing position that the allegations raised by few powers against the peaceful nuclear program of the Islamic Republic of Iran have been entirely groundless," Khazee said in written response to the AP.
[ERIC]: Is there anyone reading this BLOG who actually agrees with this? Does everyone think I am some paranoid nut case whose odd fascination with Iran is just some neo-con's peculiar past-time?
But the American U.N. ambassador said Friday that report should pave the way for passage next week of a new U.N. Security Council resolution tightening sanctions on Tehran.
"They're increasing their capabilities," U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said. "Not only have the number of centrifuges increased, but they're working on a second-generation, if you like, a more capable centrifuge.
"Things are getting worse in terms of the enrichment part."
Britain and France introduced a council resolution on Thursday — with support from the United States, Russia, China and Germany — to expand and toughen travel bans and the freezing of assets for more Iranian officials linked to the nuclear effort.
A declassified U.S. intelligence report last December judged that the Iranians had put a nuclear weapons program on hold in 2003. But the U.S., Israel and others contend Iran's continued advances in the crucial centrifuge work will eventually give it a capability to quickly build a bomb.
Much of the information purportedly linking Iran to attempts to make nuclear arms came from the United States, with allies providing lesser amounts and the IAEA passing on selected material to Tehran, after approval by the nations that gave the agency the information.
IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei, who drew up the report, said his team had "made quite good progress in clarifying the outstanding issues that had to do with Iran's past nuclear activities, with the exception of one issue, and that is the alleged weaponization studies that supposedly Iran has conducted in the past."
Ahead of the confidential report's release to the 35-nation IAEA board and the U.N. Security Council, U.S. officials had repeatedly insisted that the IAEA probe would be incomplete unless Iran acknowledged trying to make nuclear arms in the past. That stance is shared by Canada, Japan, Australia and U.S. allies in Europe.
A senior IAEA official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the report was confidential, said that if the material provided by the U.S. and other agency members on the alleged activities was genuine, most of Iran's work was "most likely for nuclear weapons."
But he said the agency was not reaching any conclusion until the Iranians went beyond rejection of the purported evidence and concretely addressed the issues it raised.
When confronted with some of the documentation from the U.S. and other on its alleged weapons experiments, Tehran "stated that the allegations were baseless and that the information ... was fabricated," the report said.
Iran explained some of its activities linked by the Americans to a weapons program as work on "air bags and for the design of safety belts," according to the report.
[ERIC]: I think Iran just insulted the entire civilized, educated world.
The report will be the focus of discussions at an IAEA board report starting March 3. At that meeting, the U.S. and its allies are weighing whether to ask the board to approve a resolution declaring that the agency was unable to shed light on Iran's suspected nuclear weapons program, according to diplomats.
___
Associated Press writers Edith M. Lederer and Charles J. Hanley at the United Nations and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.
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