U.N. atomic agency demands Iran stop all uranium work

VIENNA, Austria -- For the first time, 35 nations in the U.N. atomic watchdog agency demanded Saturday that Iran freeze all work on uranium enrichment -- a technology that can be used for nuclear arms -- and said they would judge Tehran's compliance in two months.

The resolution passed by the agency was its toughest yet on Tehran but didn't go as far as the United States had sought -- stopping short of saying Iran will automatically be sent to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions if it fails to meet the demands by November.

U.S. officials, however, insisted the 35-member board of the International Atomic Energy Agency must refer Iran to the council when it meets again on Nov. 25 if Tehran doesn't comply.

"The issue is whether or not they're going to give up nuclear weapons" by the November meeting, U.S. undersecretary of state John Bolton said. "The ball is in Iran's court."

"The time for decisive action is approaching," said Jackie Sanders, the chief U.S. delegate to the IAEA board meeting. "To wait until the IAEA finds the nuclear weapons ... is to wait until it is too late."

The United States says Iran's nuclear program is aimed at producing weapons, a claim Tehran denies.

The resolution passed unanimously Saturday said the board "considers it necessary" that Iran suspend all uranium enrichment and related programs. And it expressed alarm at Iranian plans to convert more than 40 tons of raw uranium into uranium hexafluoride -- the gas that when spun in centrifuges turns into enriched uranium.

It also said it "strongly urges" Iran to meet all demands by the agency in its investigation of the country's nearly two decades of clandestine nuclear activity, including unrestricted access to sites, information and personnel that can shed light on still unanswered questions on whether Tehran was interested in the atom for nuclear weapons.

It called on the IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei to provide a review of the findings of a more than one year probe of Iran's nuclear activities, which Tehran insists are strictly tailored toward generating electricity.

Suggesting that the Islamic Republic could answer to the U.N. Security Council should it defy the demands, the resolution said the next board meeting in November "will decide whether or not further steps are appropriate" in ensuring Iran complies.

The Americans praised the text, saying it showed the world was united against Iran's nuclear program.

ElBaradei described the text as reflecting "the collective will of the international community," adding: "The resolution is very clear as to what is expected of Iran in the next few months."

The last board resolution in June had been less insistent on the issue of suspending enrichment, a process that can develop material for nuclear weapons, or fuel for an energy program, as Iran says it intends.

Washington had pushed to drop mention of countries' rights to peaceful nuclear technology and fought for an Oct. 31 deadline, with the understanding that if Iran failed to comply the board would then automatically begin deliberations on Security Council referral.

The accepted phrasing instead left it up to the board to debate what action -- if any -- to take when it reconvenes Nov. 25 should Iran be found to have ignored the demand to freeze enrichment or other conditions.

Iran's chief delegate to the meeting, which began Monday, asserted that Washington was frustrated in its main goals -- "putting (a) deadline of Oct 31, (and) second an automatic trigger mechanism."

"Both were neglected, and we have nothing like this in the resolution," Hossain Mousavian told reporters.

In a statement faxed to the AP, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said the resolution "underlines the concerns of the international community of states regarding the Iranian nuclear program."

Still, indirectly contradicting U.S. assertions that Iran automatically belonged before the Security Council, chief German delegate Herbert Honsowitz suggested the resolution did nothing more than empower the board to "set the stage ... on how this issue can be dealt with further in the IAEA."

The U.S. undersecretary of state said that unless Iran fully meets all conditions of the resolution the board would follow America's lead come November.

"The odds are the Iranians are going to try to throw as much sand in people's eyes as they can," Bolton told the AP. "If they're still pursuing the same policies, I'm confident we are going to win that vote," on referral to the Security Council, he said.

Iran says it is honoring a pledge not to put uranium hexafluoride gas into centrifuges, spin it and make enriched uranium. But the resolution calls for a stop as well to other activities, including the assembling of centrifuges and the production of uranium hexafluoride.

Iran is not prohibited from enrichment under its obligations to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. But it has for months faced international pressure to suspend such activities as a good-faith gesture and the resolution went further by actually demanding a stop to enrichment and related activities.

Ahead of approval -- which came after days of backdoor negotiations and resistance by nonaligned countries that saw their own right to enrichment for peaceful use threatened by the text -- the chief Iranian delegate held out the possibility of meeting the resolution's key demand.

Iran's "decision-makers will decide about the main request -- full suspension," in the next few days, Mousavian told the AP.

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