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9-17-06, 8:15 am
VIENNA, September 15 (PL).— The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) qualified as outrageous and dishonest a report presented by a U.S. congressional intelligence committee on Iran’s nuclear program, according to diplomatic sources.
A letter to that effect, signed by Vilmos Cserveny, director of the Office of External and Policy Coordination for the IAEA, was delivered to Peter Hoekstra, Republican chairman of the House of Representatives Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and to Gregory Schuite, U.S. ambassador to the IAEA.
The letter qualified the information issued by the United States on Tehran’s alleged production of enriched uranium for military purposes as “erroneous, misleading and unsubstantiated.”
The IAEA noted that in order to produce weapons of mass destruction, uranium must be 90% enriched, and that to date, the Islamic Republic produces that substance at only 3.8% enrichment at its centrifuge plants.
Moreover, it dismisses as “outrageous and dishonest” U.S. claims that the agency removed one of its inspectors from Iran because he violated an “unstated IAEA policy barring its officials from telling the whole truth about the Iranian nuclear program.”
In that context, the letter notes that all countries that are signatories to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (TNP) have the right to demand the removal of any IAEA expert, and adds that Tehran has welcomed more than 200 of those specialists.
In early 2005, the Islamic Republic joined the Additional Protocol of the Treaty, which permits non-planned inspections, right as Washington was accusing the Persian nation of trying to build nuclear weapons.
By doing so, the White House created an artificial crisis around Iran’s nuclear program. The Middle East nation defends its inalienable right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy.
From Granma
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