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Iran rejects heart of nuclear proposal

20 January 2010 01:16 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Ziya Agazade â€“ APA. Iran has told the head of the U.N. nuclear agency that it does not accept an international proposal committing it to quickly export most of the material it would need to make a nuclear warhead, diplomats said Tuesday.

According to APA quoting â€œAssociated Pressâ€, Iranian officials have used the media to criticize the plan backed by most of the world’s major powers and to offer alternatives to one of its main conditions â€” that the Islamic republic ship out most of its stock of enriched uranium and then wait for up to a year for its return in the form of fuel rods for its Tehran research reactor.

But Iran now also has told the IAEA â€” which chaired the Vienna talks â€” that it wants an alternative to the plan. Its version effectively rejects the key demand that it agree to a tight timetable in shipping out most of its enriched uranium supply, said the diplomats.

The talks in Vienna came up with a draft proposal that would take 70 percent of Iran’s low-enriched uranium to reduce its stockpile of material that could be enriched to a higher level, and possibly be used to make nuclear weapons.

International concerns include Iran’s refusal to heed U.N. Security Council demands that it freeze its enrichment program; fears that it may be hiding more nuclear facilities after its belated revelations that it was building a secret fortified enrichment plant, and its stonewalling of an IAEA probe of alleged programs geared to developing nuclear arms.