Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Dec. 30 Iran maintained its right to enrich uranium on its own soil as an underlying element to any proposal from Russia to end the international deadlock over the countrys suspected nuclear weapons program. Iran Focus
Tehran, Iran, Dec. 30 Iran maintained its right to enrich uranium on its own soil as an underlying element to any proposal from Russia to end the international deadlock over the countrys suspected nuclear weapons program.
Russia had formally proposed that Tehran carry out uranium enrichment on Russian soil under international monitoring to ease international concerns that Tehran may use the material in the atomic bomb.
Javad Vaeedi, Irans head nuclear negotiator, however, told the state-owned Fars news agency that any proposal from Moscow would be considered with the understanding that Islamic Republic could also carry out enrichment inside its own borders.
It is natural that a guarantee for Irans right under the [nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty”> to carry out enrichment on its own soil within the framework of the rules of the International Atomic Energy Agency, would be the first assumption in considering the proposal, Vaeedi said.
He described the Russian proposals as an idea which Tehran would consider seriously.
The comments were, however, in line with previous positions by Irans hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the secretary-general of the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Larijani. Vaeedi is head of the international security directorate of the SNSC.
His statement was likely to dampen hopes by the European Union which had thus far led negotiations with Tehran that the file could avoid being sent to the United Nations Security Council for possible economic sanctions.
