Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani said on Monday that Tehran has informed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of its decision to resume full-scale uranium enrichment.

Iran has informed the IAEA of the date of the resumption and the agency's inspectors are expected to come to Iran in the coming days to supervise the move, Larijani was quoted by the semi- official students' news agency ISNA as saying.

Larijani made the statement one day after Iran announced that it had ended all voluntary cooperation with the IAEA, including snap U.N. inspection of its nuclear sites required by the additional protocol of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and suspension of uranium enrichment.

Iran's move came after an emergency meeting of the IAEA board of governors adopted a resolution in Vienna on Saturday to report Iran's nuclear issue to the UN Security Council.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad late Saturday ordered Iran's Atomic Energy Organization to stop implementation of the additional protocol and other voluntary measures as of Sunday.

However, Iran stressed that the suspension of voluntary measures does not mean an end to nuclear negotiations or other legal obligations.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi said on Sunday that Iran was still willing to solve nuclear dispute through negotiations and continue cooperation with the IAEA under the NPT and the Safeguard Agreement.

Iranian government signed the additional protocol to the NPT in December 2003 to allow snap inspection of its nuclear sites by the IAEA, but the protocol was never ratified by Iran's parliament.

Moreover, Iran suspended uranium enrichment related activities in November 2004 as voluntary confidence-building measures to pave the way for negotiations with the European Union trio of Britain, France and Germany.

However, Iran restarted uranium conversion, a precursor to the enrichment, in August 2005, prompting the EU trio to break off nuclear talks with Tehran.

Iran's resumption of nuclear fuel research on Jan. 10 led to its nuclear case being reported to the U.N. Security Council which would withhold action until March.

Iran has rejected the charge of seeking nuclear weapons but insisted on its right to peaceful nuclear technology.

Iran said on Sunday that it would continue negotiation with Russia on Moscow's proposal to move Iran's uranium enrichment to Russia so as to ease Western suspicion over Iran's nuclear ambition.

Source: Xinhua