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Yukiya Amano: IAEA never said that Iran had nuclear weapons

12 June 2012 14:14 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Konul Jafarli â€“ APA. â€œWe never said that Iran had nuclear weaponsâ€, said Yukiya Amano, Director General of the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency, in his interview with The Wall Street Journal in Vienna following the agency’s talks with Iran last week.

â€œWe are disappointed; we don’t think the process is broken down. The talks will continue. The date is not yet fixed. We need to digest the exchange of views from today. But after today’s meeting without any progress, and with some setbacks, I cannot be in an optimistic mood.â€
Amano spoke about his visit to Iran: â€œThis was the first time I met with Iran’s chief negotiator Saeed Jalili. The most important meeting on the structured approach was with Mr. Jalili. We covered many fields. He explained the basic position of Iran. We did not have the same view in many areas, but we had common ground, too. I sensed that the differences were very narrow. I was told the differences would not be the obstacle. I had hoped we would be able to reach an agreement, sign and implement it quite soon.â€

â€œWhat we did not say was that Iran had nuclear weapons. We never said such. We also did not say that Iran made a decision to obtain nuclear weapons. That we also did not say. But we said that we have concerns in various areas that indicate activities that are relevant to nuclear explosive devicesâ€, Amano said.