Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hassan Qashqavi said on Monday that Iran has no reason to stop uranium enrichment as there is no guarantee that the West would meet the country's demand on nuclear fuel.
Iran has no reason to stop its uranium enrichment activities to provide necessary fuel for its nuclear power plants as the countries that claimed to supply nuclear fuel have failed to keep their words, Qashqavi told reporters in his weekly news briefing.
"It is a fact known in the world that talks which had started 20 years ago for setting up a committee to guarantee nuclear fuel supply, have not reached any conclusion yet," said Qashqavi, quoted by the official IRNA news agency.
Uranium enrichment is an absolute right for Iran based on the Non-Proliferation Treaty and Tehran would pursue this right to the end, Tehran has stressed.
Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki also said on Sunday that Iran will never halt uranium enrichment even if the West guarantees its need for nuclear fuel.
The remarks came after Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), reportedly said last week that Iran would consider stopping sensitive uranium enrichment if guaranteed a supply of nuclear fuel from abroad.
The UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1835 recently to reaffirm its previous resolutions on Iran and demand full compliance from the Islamic Republic.
It called on Iran "to comply fully and without delay with its obligations" under the resolutions, and to meet the requirements of the IAEA Board of Governors, but without new sanctions.
Iran till now has been under three UN sanctions over its disputed nuclear program.
According to a recent IAEA report, due to Tehran's block, the UN nuclear watchdog had been unable to make much progress in investigating Iran's suspect nuclear program.
The United States and its allies have accused Iran of developing nuclear weapons, but Iran insists that its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes.
Source:Xinhua
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