IRAN: France, Britain and Germany are drafting a UN nuclear resolution on Iran that could set them on course for a confrontation with Tehran at an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) board meeting next week, diplomats said.
The IAEA, the UN nuclear watchdog, issued a report last week praising Iran for granting UN inspectors access to sites, but said it has continued to change its story about imports of nuclear technology that could be used to develop atomic weapons.
"The three Europeans'...draft resolution is going to say that there are areas where Iran has been co-operating with the agency and areas where they haven't been cooperating," a Western diplomat on the IAEA's board of governors said.
"It will also tell them (the Iranians) to co-operate more," the diplomat said, adding that the point of the resolution will be to keep the inspection process going.
Iran, which says its nuclear programme is peaceful, wants to be off the IAEA board's agenda as a special item, but diplomats on the board said the resolution would likely keep Tehran on the agenda for some time.
Iran said yesterday it had done everything necessary to clear up concerns about the programme, which the US said could be used to make atomic bombs.
IAEA chief Dr Mohamed ElBaradei said yesterday the agency hoped it could wind up its probe into Iran's nuclear programme within the next few months.
"I would hope it's a matter of months that we should be able to bring these issues to closure," he said at a symposium in the eastern French town of Talloires.
Dr ElBaradei said he also hoped a second dossier Tehran has provided - after an incomplete first report - was now the full picture of the programme.
The UN has been investigating Iran since an exiled Iranian opposition group reported in August 2002 that Tehran was hiding a massive uranium enrichment plant at Natanz and other sites from UN inspectors.
The IAEA's new Iran report and the draft resolution prepared by the three European countries will be the main topics of discussion at a meeting of the IAEA's 35-nation board that begins on June 14th. The Europeans have been working with Iran since last year to get them to end their uranium enrichment programme in exchange for peaceful nuclear technology.