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Iran May Be Stonewalling Nuclear Investigation

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The Associated Press

Published: May 27, 2008

VIENNA, Austria - Iran may be withholding information needed to establish whether it tried to make nuclear arms, the International Atomic Energy said Monday in an unusually strongly worded report.

The tone of the language suggesting Tehran continues to stonewall the agency - the U.N. nuclear monitor - revealed a glimpse of the frustration felt by IAEA investigators stymied in their attempts to gain full answers to suspicious aspects of Iran's past nuclear activities.

Iran has described its cooperation with the IAEA probe of its alleged nuclear weapons experiments as positive, suggesting it was providing information requested by agency officials. Indirectly disagreeing, the agency also said Iran continued to deny such activities, dismissing evidence to the contrary submitted for its perusal as misleading or false.

The findings were part of a restricted agency report forwarded to the U.N. Security Council and to the 35 board members of the International Atomic Energy Agency that was obtained by The Associated Press.

The nine-page report also said that Tehran remains defiant of U.N. Security Council demands to stop uranium enrichment.

But addressing whether Iran was complying with agency requests, the report said that "Iran has not provided the Agency with all the information, access to documents and access to individuals necessary to support Iran's statements" that its activities were purely peaceful in intent.

"The Agency is of the view that Iran may have additional information, in particular on high explosives testing and missile related activities which ... Iran should share with the agency," the report said, referring to two alleged sets of tests agency officials say could be tied to a nuclear program.

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