Iran ready for 'full' cooperation with IAEA: envoy

Iran ready for 'full' cooperation with IAEA: envoy

Iran's ambassador to the UN's nuclear watchdog said here Friday that Tehran was ready for "full" cooperation with that agency and was prepared to answer all questions about its nuclear program, RIA Novosti news agency reported.

"Iran plans to continue its full cooperation with the IAEA. We are ready to eliminate all outstanding doubts about our nuclear dossier," the envoy, Ali Akbar Salehi, was quoted as saying in a speech to participants at a security conference in Moscow.

Salehi's comments came a day after a senior UN nuclear inspector put off a trip to Iran in what diplomats in Vienna said was a clear sign that Tehran is failing to give the UN atomic agency key concessions it demands.

RIA Novosti reported that he also said the Iranian leadership was prepared to place its nuclear facilities under the control of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), but it provided no direct quotation from him to this effect.

The Iranian envoy said that Tehran had been conducting nuclear energy research for more than 30 years.

"It is our right to continue research under IAEA control," Salehi said.

"The United States and Europe have no right to demand from us an immediate halt to our research, which is strictly for peaceful ends."

The envoy said he was confident that the IAEA "will resolve this problem with a technical -- and not political -- point of view through negotiation and discussion in the framework of this international organization."

The development comes as the UN Security Council waits to see if Iran honors an April 28 deadline for it to halt uranium enrichment that could be weapons-related and to cooperate fully with inspectors from the Vienna-based IAEA.

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