Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Jan. 05 Iran denied on Wednesday a report in the British daily Guardian which said that Western intelligence believed that Tehran was scouring Europe for the sophisticated equipment needed to develop a nuclear bomb. Iran Focus
Tehran, Iran, Jan. 05 Iran denied on Wednesday a report in the British daily Guardian which said that Western intelligence believed that Tehran was scouring Europe for the sophisticated equipment needed to develop a nuclear bomb.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi described the report as baseless.
It is clear that damaging international atmosphere and disseminating forged information is merely in benefit of those who want to impede the current trend of negotiation, Asefi said, adding that Tehran will continue its nuclear work in the framework of its national interests and rights, without being influenced by such propaganda.
The Guardian wrote on Wednesday that a 55-page intelligence assessment, dated July 1 2005, taking material gathered by British, French, German and Belgian agencies, was used to brief European government ministers and to warn leading industrialists of the need for vigilance when exporting equipment or expertise to so-called rogue states.
The assessment declared that Iran has developed an extensive web of front companies, official bodies, academic institutes and middlemen dedicated to obtaining – in western Europe and in the former Soviet Union – the expertise, training, and equipment for nuclear programmes, missile development, and biological and chemical weapons arsenals, according to the British daily.
In addition to sensitive goods, Iran continues intensively to seek the technology and know-how for military applications of all kinds, the report added.
