[FREE IRAN Project] In The Spirit Of Cyrus The Great

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U.S., EU Did Not Make Nuke Offer to Iran — Rice

Created: 15.11.2005

MosNews
http://www.mosnews.com/news/2005/11/15/riceiran.shtml

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has denied there is any EU-U.S. backing of a Russian proposal to resolve a long-running nuclear dispute with Iran, BBC News reports.

“There is no U.S.-European proposal to the Iranians, I want to say that categorically,” Rice said. “There is not and there will not be. We are not parties to these negotiations and we do not intend to become parties to the negotiations.”

The proposal would permit Iran to conduct very limited nuclear activities on its own soil, while the enrichment of uranium would take place in Russia.

Without a new proposal to break the current impasse over Tehran’s nuclear program, the dispute may be referred to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions to be imposed on Iran.

Iran has insisted that its nuclear program is entirely intended for peaceful purposes.

The latest Russian proposal was discussed at length earlier this week at a meeting between Condoleezza Rice and Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog. According to the New York Times, it has deeply divided the administration of the U.S. President George W. Bush.

“The problem with this offer is that if the Iranians have a secret enrichment plant someplace that we do not know about, we are leaving them with the raw material they need,” a senior American official was quoted as saying.

The U.S. fears Iran could use the highly enriched uranium to build a nuclear weapon.