Iran disappointed with IAEA Director General’s report

February 21, 2010 - 16:53 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net -
Iran is disappointed with IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano’s report, Iranian Foreign Ministry’s Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said.

“On the last negotiations with the P5+1 in Geneva, Iran’s proposed package was on the agenda and we are waiting for member countries of group to continue the negotiations on the package,” Mehmanparast told ISNA. “We are ready to exchange and buy fuel needed for Tehran’s research reactor, provided that they fulfill our conditions. Political pressure aimed to deprive us of our rights, are illegal and illogical,” he said.

“The IAEA must recognize Iran’s peaceful nuclear rights legitimate and provide our needs in this regard. Iran is the country which has the most cooperation with the agency and is inspected by the IAEA,” Mehmanparast added. “Our nuclear activities are completely clear and observed by the agency. We have repeated this many times and the IAEA’s report has admitted it repeatedly.”

Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, for his part, lashed out at the positions adopted by certain western countries against Iran's nuclear program and their instrumental view and use of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

“Some western countries are trying to mislead the international community,” he said.

Iran's nuclear program

Iran's leaders have worked to pursue nuclear energy technology since the 1950s, spurred by the launch of U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower's Atoms for Peace program. It made steady progress, with Western help, through the early 1970s. But concern over Iranian intentions followed by the upheaval of the Islamic Revolution in 1979 effectively ended outside assistance. Iran was known to be reviving its civilian nuclear programs during the 1990s, but revelations in 2002 and 2003 of clandestine research into fuel enrichment and conversion raised international concern that Iran's ambitions had metastasized beyond peaceful intent. Although Iran has consistently denied allegations it seeks to develop a bomb, the September 2009 revelation of a second uranium enrichment facility near the holy city of Qom -constructed under the radar of international inspectors - deepened suspicion surrounding Iran's nuclear ambitions.