AFP: Iran is determined to resume its suspended nuclear activities but is postponing such a step for several days to
allow a new round of talks with the European Union, Tehran’s nuclear negotiator was quoted as saying Sunday by the IRNA news agency. “Iran’s decision to resume (uranium conversion) activities at the Isfahan plant is definitive,” said Cyrus Nasseri, Iran’s negotiator at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). AFP
TEHRAN – Iran is determined to resume its suspended nuclear activities but is postponing such a step for several days to allow a new round of talks with the European Union, Tehran’s nuclear negotiator was quoted as saying Sunday by the IRNA news agency.
“Iran’s decision to resume (uranium conversion) activities at the Isfahan plant is definitive,” said Cyrus Nasseri, Iran’s negotiator at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
“We have to officially announce (this) by letter to the IAEA, but as the Europeans have demanded a new high-level meeting we have postponed for several days the announcement of the resumption” of conversion activities, he was quoted as saying by IRNA.
On Friday Iran began backing away from a threat to kick-start its suspended uranium conversion work, a move that would have violated an agreement with three European Union nations.
Britain, France and Germany had warned Tehran that any violation of their November 2004 agreement on suspending uranium conversion work would have “consequences” for the country, and proposed new high-level talks.
Iran’s top nuclear official Hossein Moussavian, said Saturday that a meeting with the foreign ministers of Britain, France and Germany could take place in Europe within days.
Uranium conversion involves turning mined uranium “yellowcake” into uranium tetrafluoride (UF4) and then into uranium hexafluoride (UF6), a feed gas for centrifuges that carry out the highly sensitive enrichment process.
Iran says it wants to master the enrichment process to produce fuel for reactors, but the technology could also be diverted to make the explosive core of a bomb.
