The Iranian Regime Seeking To Smuggle Raw Uranium

The Associated Press

Iran is close to clinching a deal to clandestinely import 1,350 tons of purified uranium ore from Kazakhstan, according to an intelligence report obtained by The Associated Press. The assessment is heightening international concern about Tehran’s nuclear activities, diplomats said. Such a deal would be significant because, according to an independent research group, Tehran appears to be running out of the material, which it needs to feed its uranium enrichment program. Kazakh Foreign Ministry spokesman Yerzhan Ashikbayev denied Wednesday his government was involved, saying that the ex-Soviet nation has fully observed its international obligations. “All Kazakhstan’s activities in the uranium sphere have been under the IAEA control,” he told the AP. A spokesman for Kazatomprom, the Kazakh state uranium company, also denied involvement. Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York described the report as “a fabrication and completely baseless,” in a statement faxed to the AP in Tehran. The report was drawn up by a member nation of the International Atomic Energy Agency and provided Tuesday to the AP on condition that the country not be identified because of the confidential nature of the information.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said, “the transfer of any uranium yellowcake … to Iran would constitute a clear violation of UNSC sanctions.” “We have been engaged with many of our international nonproliferation partners on Iran’s illicit efforts to acquire new supplies of uranium over the past several years,” he said. A senior U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was talking about confidential information said late Tuesday that Washington was aware of the intelligence report, but he declined to discuss specifics. “We are not going to discuss our private consultations with other governments on such matters but, suffice to say, we have been engaged with Kazakhstan and many of our other international nonproliferation partners on this subject in particular over the past several years,” he told the AP. “We will continue to have those discussions.” In New York, Burkina Faso’s U.N. Ambassador Michel Kafando, a co-chair of the Security Council’s Iran sanctions committee, referred questions Tuesday about a potential deal between Iran and Kazakhstan to his sanctions adviser, Zongo Saidou. Speaking in New York, Saidou told the AP that, as far as he knew, none of the U.N.’s member nations has alerted the committee about any such allegations. (Read more...)