AFP: The US ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, on Thursday called Iran “a threat to international peace” but added that it remains to be seen how the UN Security Council can resolve the nuclear crisis.
BERLIN, Jan 12, 2006 (AFP) – The US ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, on Thursday called Iran “a threat to international peace” but added that it remains to be seen how the UN Security Council can resolve the nuclear crisis.
“Imagine that kind of system with its finger on the nuclear trigger,” said Bolton in a lecture in Berlin, referring to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s regime.
“It is a very great threat to international peace and security. … It remains to be seen what role the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Security Council together can lead in handling the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear programme.”
Bolton was speaking at the Aspen Institute just hours after the foreign ministers of the three EU powers which have been negotiating with Iran on its nuclear programme held crisis talks in the German capital.
Iran sparked international ire on Tuesday by breaking IAEA seals at nuclear facilities in order to resume nuclear fuel work.
Britain, France and Germany responded by urging UN Security Council action, saying two years of delicate negotiations with Tehran had reached a “dead end.”
They said they would ask the IAEA, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, to call a meeting with a view to referring the matter to the Security Council, which could potentially impose sanctions on Tehran.
Washington has long asserted that Iran’s nuclear programme is a front to develop atomic weapons, an allegation that the Islamic republic denies.
