11 March 2004 16:04
Russia dislikes UN nuke resolution on Iran -diplomats
Russia dislikes the explicit reference to a military link to Iran's nuclear programme in a draft U.N. nuclear resolution backed by the United States and would like this section deleted, diplomats said on Thursday.
Earlier this week, the United States and the European Union's "Big Three" – France, Britain and Germany – reached a tentative agreement on an Australian-Canadian draft text that "deplores" Tehran's withholding of sensitive information from U.N. inspectors and highlights its possible military dimension.
Russia, which is helping Tehran build a $800 million nuclear power station in Iran, has objected and tried to soften every U.S.-backed IAEA resolution or statement on Iran in the past year. Russian U.N. delegates in Vienna declined to comment.
"Russia doesn't like this reference to the military and would like to see it out," said one diplomat. Another said Moscow's concerns about the text were "no surprise".
The draft resolution, to be submitted to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors, stops short of referring Iran to the U.N. Security Council for sanctions. But U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said he was confident Iran would be warned it could face sanctions.
Iran accused Washington of "bullying" the IAEA and warned the resolution could "complicate" its ties with the watchdog. The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which has 13 seats on the 35-nation IAEA board, also voiced concerns about the text, but Western states were working to bring them round. A non-aligned diplomat said NAM had suggested only "minor changes".
Moscow's concerns about the resolution come amid worries that President Vladimir Putin's downgrading of Russia's Atomic Energy Ministry to a state agency may kill off a plan to finish the nuclear reactor in Iran, removing a big stumbling block in Russia-U.S. ties, according to industry insiders in Russia.
The Atomic Energy Ministry has spearheaded the $800 million project in Bushehr, Iran, defying repeated U.S. accusations – and the Kremlin's growing recognition of Washington's concerns – that Iran is secretly developing nuclear weapons.
The draft resolution cites IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei's finding in his February 24 report on Iran that "most of the workshops used in Iran's centrifuge enrichment programme are "owned by military industrial organisations". But ElBaradei said: "That doesn't mean it is a military programme. We have seen many of these workshops situated in military sites."
Hardline states say that if the programme was a civilian power programme, it would be owned by oil-rich Iran's well-developed energy sector.
Diplomats said that if the IAEA board goes on the record acknowledging a possible military link, hardline critics of Iran like Washington will have more ammunition to argue that finishing Bushehr may lead to violating the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) if Moscow unwittingly supports a weapons programme. "This is a theoretical concern, but it is one that the Russians have," one of the diplomats said.
Nuclear powers China, France, Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union signed the 1968 NPT, pledging they would "not in any way assist, encourage, or induce any non-nuclear-weapon state to manufacture or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons".
Once Bushehr is complete, the fuel the reactor burns will contain plutonium, useable in weapons. Russia says it will eventually take back the fuel, but Washington fears Iran might divert it to extract plutonium before the fuel is returned.
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