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Evidence May Indicate Iran Closing In on Nuclear Arms

Los Angeles Times - By Douglas Frantz
Aug 27, 2003

International inspectors confirmed Tuesday that particles of highly enriched uranium had been discovered in two separate samples taken at a nuclear facility in Iran, raising the possibility that Tehran is further along in developing a nuclear weapon than experts had predicted.

The finding was contained in a confidential report prepared by the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna that provided detailed descriptions of numerous contradictions and misstatements by Iran in recent months. A copy of the 10-page report was provided to The Times by a source outside the agency.

It was clear that critical questions about Iran's nuclear program remained unanswered in the report, particularly about uranium enrichment, the purification process that creates fuel for reactors or material for weapons. Those questions are significant because the answers could indicate a weapons program and because Iran is required under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to disclose any such enrichment to the IAEA.

The report did not link the minute traces of highly enriched uranium found at the Natanz nuclear plant in central Iran to any weapons effort. Although a diplomat who reviewed the report said the particles were not proof that Iran had enriched uranium, he said that discovery and other findings were strong evidence that Tehran had lied about its nuclear activities.

Iran insists that it is only building commercial nuclear reactors to generate electricity and dismissed the particles as contamination from before it acquired the equipment. The United States has accused Iran of using its commercial program to disguise a clandestine effort to build a nuclear bomb.

Attempts to reach Iranian officials in Vienna and Tehran were unsuccessful. The official Iranian news agency IRNA said that Iran's representative to the IAEA said the country was ready to sign an agreement to allow more intrusive international inspections of its nuclear facilities.

"Iran would like to clarify some aspects regarding the preservation of its sovereignty due to the so-called undeclared inspections that are envisioned," Ali Akbar Salehi, the representative, was quoted as saying.

Melissa Fleming, a spokeswoman for the IAEA in Vienna, said in a telephone interview that inspectors were analyzing information from five trips to Iran since the previous report, issued in June. That document criticized Iran for concealing previous nuclear activities and was somewhat harsher in tone.

The latest report said the discovery of the highly enriched uranium particles at Natanz and an Iranian admission of uranium conversion at another facility appeared to contradict earlier claims by Iran that it had not enriched uranium.

Iran also told the agency in recent days that it had obtained technology for enriching uranium from unidentified foreign sources in the late 1980s, the report said. Iran had previously told the agency that it had developed the technology on its own, beginning in 1997.

Although the report praised Tehran for improved cooperation, it also complained that "information and access were at times slow in coming and incremental."

The agency's 35-nation board is scheduled to meet Sept. 8. The United States is expected to push for a finding that Iran is not complying with the nonproliferation treaty and ask for the matter to be referred to the United Nations Security Council. The council could order sanctions.

A senior Bush administration official said in a telephone interview from Washington that the United States will certainly press for the issue to be taken to the Security Council and for Iran to be declared in noncompliance.

"We are disappointed that the IAEA did not come right out and say that the Iranians have been lying to them and have not been cooperating. I wish the IAEA could be more blunt about this, but the facts are in the report," the official said.

The discrepancy was one of a series of contradictions and gaps in the report in which Iran acknowledged specific activities only after repeated requests and outside pressure.

"What seems clear is that Iran has got caught up in some lies and is giving ground grudgingly and slowly," said a European diplomat who had been briefed on the new report.

For months inspectors tried to get access to a small workshop outside Tehran called Kalaye Electric Co. An Iranian exile group had said that the facility, officially described as a watch factory, was part of the secret nuclear complex.

In March and again in June, inspectors were denied full access to the site. In July, Iran told the agency that it was not yet willing to permit samples to be taken at Kalaye.

In meetings in Tehran on Aug. 9, Iran acknowledged for the first time that its enrichment activities were concentrated at Kalaye from 1997 until last year and it agreed to permit the inspectors to take environmental samples to determine whether uranium was enriched there.

The analysis of the samples is not finished, but the report said it was unclear whether the results would be of any use because of structural changes and modifications at Kalaye since the March visit.

Iranian officials said the construction was part of the facility's conversion to new uses, but a nuclear expert familiar with the report and the inspection process said, "They sanitized the place."

The U.S. official said, "They repainted and cleaned the rooms to try to hide the evidence that there had been uranium reprocessing there. That was a nice way of putting the fact that they were trying to cover it up."

A former Iranian security official went further, saying in a recent interview with The Times that workers removed 6 feet of topsoil from areas within Kalaye and rebuilt some rooms.

The earlier samples taken at Natanz, about 200 miles south of Tehran, found evidence of highly enriched uranium, but there are questions about its origin.

When IAEA officials were allowed in last February, they found a huge facility under construction. There was a pilot plant for enriching uranium by using gas centrifuges, and two underground halls to contain thousands of centrifuges.

Iran told the agency several times that it had developed its centrifuge program without outside help and without using enriched uranium, both assertions doubted by outside experts and some inspectors, according to interviews this summer and the report.

IAEA inspectors took environmental samples at Natanz between March and June. At a meeting with Iranian officials in July, the inspectors said one sample had tested positive for particles of highly enriched uranium, according to the report.

The Iranians said they would look into the matter. On Aug. 9, the Iranians told the agency that the particles had come from contamination of centrifuge components imported by Iran, according to the report.

But the inspectors replied that a new analysis completed since the July disclosure had revealed a second type of highly enriched uranium from a different centrifuge machine, the report said. Additional samples were still being analyzed, and the agency said it had not reached a final conclusion on the origin of the enriched uranium.

The agency said it was also investigating uranium conversion activities at research facilities using uranium chemicals imported secretly from China in 1991.

Iran had said it never used nuclear material in its research, according to the report. But after pressure from the inspectors, Iran acknowledged last week in a letter to the agency that it had undertaken uranium conversion experiments in the early 1990s.

Also for the first time, Iran said it had acquired some of its centrifuge technology from foreign entities. The countries were not identified in the report, but nuclear experts say the supplier is probably Pakistan.

"Several indications point to Pakistan," said David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, based in Washington. The centrifuge design and other components necessary to enrich uranium are similar to designs circulated by Abdul Qadeer Khan, considered the father of Pakistan's nuclear bomb.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran27aug27001432,1,2038537.story?coll=la-headlines-world

Iran Urges Release Of Ex-diplomat at UK Straw Meeting

Dow Jones - World News
Aug 27, 2003

LONDON -- Iran has called on the U.K. for the speedy release of a former Iranian diplomat, arrested over the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires.

Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for Euro-American affairs Ali Ahani met U.K. Foreign Secretary Jack Straw Tuesday to call for the former diplomat to be released, Iran's official news agency IRNA reports on its Web site.

Hadi Soleimanpour was arrested in the U.K. last Thursday for his alleged involvement in the Argentinian bombing.

An Argentine judge is seeking the extradition of eight Iranians, including Soleimanpour, Iran's ambassador to Argentina when the explosion killed dozens of people.

"The decision of the Argentine judiciary was politically-motivated and the verdict lacked validity," IRNA quoted Ahani as saying.

IRNA reported that Straw assured Ahani he would take all necessary steps within the framework of the U.K.'s judicial system.

The U.K. Foreign Office said Straw told Ahani that the arrest is a judicial matter and the government cannot intervene.

Wednesday, the Financial Times reported that Iran is threatening to expel the U.K.'s ambassador to Tehran and downgrade diplomatic relations over the arrest.

President Mohammad Khatami has referred to the arrest as "incorrect" and "tactless" and the row threatens to derail the U.K.'s "constructive engagement" policy with Tehran.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_1971.shtml

Iraq's leaky border with Iran

Christian Science Monitor - By James Hider
Aug 27, 2003

Iraqi border police say Arab fighters are being smuggled in as Shiite pilgrims.

AL MUNTHRIYA, IRAQ – Iraq's border with Iran is an open door for thousands of Iranian Shiite pilgrims being smuggled across the frontier, say Iraqi police. And their numbers may also be swollen by Arab fighters.

Iraqi border police at the northeastern crossing point of Al Munthriya say that members of two leading Shiite parties in Iraq's US-appointed Governing Council are helping the illegal pilgrim trade, unwittingly aiding the passage of terrorists, spies, and saboteurs into the country.

Police say that Arab fighters from Afghanistan and members of Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda may also be exploiting clandestine routes through the arid hill country on the frontier, where pilgrims dodge scant border controls with support from members of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) and Islamic Dawa.

Col. Nazzim Sherif Mohammed, commander of the Iraqi border police at Al Munthriya, says SCIRI and Dawa members have set up floating border posts in the desert and are providing guides to ferry pilgrims past official border posts to reach the holy Shiite cities of Najaf and Karabala.

Colonel Mohammed and his team say they doubt the parties' leaders are aware of the operations, but express frustration that groups linked to the country's emerging leadership could be inadvertently aiding terrorists.

"It is chaos. Anyone can come in and we can't control this. We can't tell who's a pilgrim and who's a terrorist," says Awat Dawoud, head of customs a Al Munthriya, where several hundred Kurds and former opposition members have joined the new coalition-backed border police force. "We captured some Iranians and brought them here. They told us that people from Dawa and Hakim's party [SCIRI] were taking $50" to bring people across the border, says Mohammed.

Adel Abdul Mehdi, a spokesman for SCIRI, says he has no knowledge of his party's involvement in the illegal pilgrim trade, which he notes had existed before the war when visits by Iranians were restricted.

But he admits that SCIRI members could be involved in bringing family members over from Iran. Most of the Iranians clandestinely crossing the border on foot or by truck are innocent pilgrims heading for the cities of Karbala and Najaf, to the south of Baghdad. The cities are home to the ornate shrines of Imam Hussein and Imam Ali, descendents of the prophet Muhammad.

None of the pilgrims has a visa as Iraq has not yet resumed its foreign consular services. In Najaf and Karbala, throngs of Iranian pilgrims in Islamic green bandannas and prayer shawls worship at the shrines every day, wielding video cameras and posing happily in groups outside mosques.

In some Najaf restaurants, the clientele are almost exclusively Iranians wolfing down chicken and rice after a long, arduous journey. One pilgrim says proudly he walked six days to reach Najaf from Iran. Others says they drove across in cars. All decline to give details of the crossing. Some estimate that as many as 2,000 people cross the border every day.

Najaf hotel owner Farhan Shibli says his rooms are booked solid with Iranian guests. He welcomes the economic bonanza during such lean times, but voices misgivings about their presence in the country. "They come as pilgrims but some are smugglers and some can be considered spies," he says. "It's quite possible there are saboteurs among them."

He says some of his guests act suspiciously, changing clothes several times a day, dressing as Westerners or Arabs or even foreign journalists. "The coalition should do something about this problem," he says.

Paul Bremer, the top US civilian administrator, said on Saturday that the country's borders are difficult to guard, despite having 2,500 personnel watching them.

"We'd clearly like to have greater control over the borders. We agree there is a problem and we are addressing it," he told reporters.

http://search.csmonitor.com/search_content/0827/p17s01-woiq.html

US helps Iranians to bypass web censorship

Sidney Morning Herald - By Online Staff
Aug 27, 2003

Iranians who wish to bypass the restrictions placed on accessing certain web sites by their own government, can now do so courtesy the US government and the privacy company Anonymizer, according to a report at SecurityFocus.

The US has paid Anonymizer an undisclosed sum to provide any of the two million Iranians who are said to have internet access a free web proxy services which is designed to circumvent the online censorship instituted by Teheran, the report said.

Iran issued a list of 15,000 prohibited sites in May.

The free proxy only accepts connections from the Iranian IP address space and provides instructions in Farsi.

The URLs for the service are publicised over Radio Farda, an American station that broadcasts a mix of pop music and western news and is aimed at Iranian youth.

The report said the service was similar to one which had been provided to Chinese citizens by Anonymizer under a similar contract which ended earlier this year.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_1978.shtml

UN report stokes fears of Iran atom bomb

Reuters - World News
Aug 27, 2003

VIENNA - Iran's repeated failure to inform the U.N. nuclear agency of its atomic activities, as detailed in the agency's new Iran report, boosts fears that Tehran wants nuclear weapons, Western diplomats said on Wednesday.

Several diplomats, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said the Iran report showed Tehran was in breach of its U.N. nuclear safeguards obligations. They said there were reasons for the agency's governing board to declare Iran in "non-compliance" with its U.N. Safeguards Agreement.

A verdict of non-compliance would require the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) board to notify the U.N. Security Council, which has the power to impose economic sanctions.

"There are grounds for a verdict of non-compliance," said a Western diplomat. "It's a pattern of activities that's not just disquieting but of great concern."

Asked if the report confirmed suspicions Iran aims to build a nuclear arsenal, one Western diplomat said simply: "Yes."

Iranian officials were not immediately available for comment, though Tehran insists it is cooperating fully with the IAEA and has nothing to hide about its nuclear programme.

Iran said on Tuesday it was ready to sign up to snap inspections of its nuclear programme, but said it wanted prior clarification on "the preservation of its sovereignty".

The United States, which branded Iran part of an "axis of evil" with North Korea and pre-war Iraq, accuses the Islamic republic of secretly developing atomic weapons, a charge Tehran denies.

The report said traces of weapons-grade highly-enriched uranium were found in samples at the Natanz nuclear facility. Iran blamed this on contaminated components imported for centrifuges, an explanation the IAEA is probing.

One diplomat said this explanation was suspicious as Iran refuses to say where it bought the components and had originally claimed the centrifuges were entirely domestic. Cenfrifuges are used to enrich, or purify, the uranium to make it useable in nuclear fuel -- or weapons.

MODIFICATIONS

The IAEA also said Iran had carried out "modifications" at the Kalaye Electric Company workshop, where centrifuge parts are made, before letting the IAEA take samples to verify no undeclared nuclear activity had taken place.

Diplomats said these extensive modifications raised concerns Iran sanitised Kalaye before letting inspectors take the samples after months of refusing the IAEA's request.

"It sounds like they've got something to hide," a diplomat said.

While praising Iran's cooperation since the agency's harsh June report, the IAEA said "some of the information was in contrast to that previously provided by Iran".

The Western diplomats said this was simply a polite way of saying that Iran has repeatedly lied to the agency.

"That wording is an incredible understatement," a diplomat said. "I can count around six areas where they changed their positions. And it wasn't as if they came forward...They were dragged to it because the IAEA came up with the facts."

For instance, the IAEA report said that Iran had admitted that its uranium enrichment programme began in the 1980s and not in the 1990s as it had originally told the U.N.

Diplomats also expressed concern that Iran has been experimenting with the creation of uranium metal, which has few civilian uses but is very useful in nuclear weapons.

The 35-member IAEA board begins meeting on September 8 to discuss the Iran report.

The diplomats said there was a growing group of states, led by the U.S., on the IAEA board, which believe there are grounds to report Iran to the Security Council now. But there are more than a dozen countries on the board who tend to support Iran.

Pursuing a separate diplomatic initiative over the nuclear crisis involving North Korea, Washington and Pyongyang sat down on Wednesday for talks in China with North Korea's neighbours.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=3345345

EU sidesteps row over Iran envoy's arrest

Financial Times - By Judy Dempsey in Brussels, Najmeh Bozorgmehr in Tehran and Adam Thomson in Buenos Aires
Aug 27, 2003

European Union officials were trying to prevent its relations with Iran becoming embroiled in the latest diplomatic row involving Tehran and Brussels on Wednesday.

The attempt to keep bilateral issues separate from the EU's broader strategy with Iran came after Belgian security forces tried to arrest a senior Iranian diplomat serving in Brussels.

Last week Britain arrested Hadi Soleimanpour, the former Iranian ambassador to Argentina, after Argentina had requested his extradition for alleged involvement in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish centre in Buenos Aires that killed 84 people.

The Belgians were acting on Interpol instructions to arrest Saeed Baghban, third secretary in the Brussels embassy.

The request was in response to extradition proceedings recently begun by Juan José Galeano, an Argentine judge who has named eight former Iranian diplomats being sought for their alleged participation in the Jewish centre bombing.

Mr Baghban, responsible for consular affairs, was leaving the country when the security services tried to arrest him.

Antoine Eurard, Belgium's chargé d'affaires in Iran, was summoned to the foreign ministry and asked to ensure Mr Baghban's early release. Mr Baghban was questioned and allowed return to the embassy after the Belgian foreign ministry confirmed his diplomatic immunity.

Belgian diplomats said they did not expect any moves by the Iranian authorities to expel any of their embassy staff. Iran has threatened to expel Britain's ambassador to Tehran and downgrade diplomatic relations in protest at Mr Soleimanpour's arrest.

Diplomats are concerned that the poor relations between Britain and Iran - which had markedly improved over the past year - could spill over into broader relations between Tehran and the EU.

The EU, with strong backing from London, had recently started negotiations on a lucrative trade and co-operation agreement (TCA) with Iran.

Progress on the trade issues is linked to progress on political issues, such as human rights, fighting terrorism, Middle East peace and Iran's compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

In recent weeks the TCA talks have stalled - but not officially suspended - as the EU awaits next month's report on Iran's nuclear programme by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

A Commission official said: "We are waiting to see what the IAEA concludes. We do not want any bilateral issues to impinge on EU relations with Iran."

The Iranian government has cut off economic and cultural ties with Argentina, though not diplomatic relations, over the arrest warrants.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_1988.shtml

Finger pointing in Kazemi case

Globe & Mail - By AP & CP
Aug 27, 2003

Tehran — Iran's reformists accused hardliners of a coverup, with a parliamentarian reporting Wednesday that a judiciary agent had been blamed for the murder of a Montreal photojournalist who died after being beaten in custody.

Such charges and countercharges have characterized Iran's probe into the death of Zahra Kazemi, which has become the latest battleground in the power struggle between elected reformers and hardliners who control Iran's police force, judiciary and security agencies.

Earlier this week, the hardline Tehran prosecutor, whose office is part of the judiciary, issued a statement in which an independent judge said two Intelligence Ministry agents had been indicted "on charges of involvement in the semi-premeditated murder" of Ms. Kazemi. The Intelligence Ministry is loosely controlled by reformists.

However, a Canadian newspaper report said the two indicted were reportedly low-level female medical workers: a nurse and a personal caregiver.

Reformist legislator Naser Qavami told The Associated Press on Wednesday that a top Intelligence Ministry official told a closed meeting of parliament late Tuesday that a judiciary official working in the prison where Mr. Kazemi was held had beat her, leading to her death.

Mr. Qavami did not name the accused judiciary official. Intelligence Ministry officials contacted by the AP also refused to name their suspect.

The legislator said ministry officials also accused the judiciary of moving prison officers who witnessed the beating of Kazemi to different positions and pressuring them not to tell what they saw. During the closed parliament session, the officials also accused the judiciary of tampering with prison records and forcing Intelligence Ministry agents to accept responsibility for the murder.

Ms. Kazemi, 54, died July 10, nearly three weeks after being detained for taking photographs outside a Tehran prison during student-led protests. Prisons are under the authority of the hardline judiciary.

Initially, the hardline Tehran prosecutor, Saeed Mortazavi, was quoted as saying Ms. Kazemi had died of a stroke.

On July 30, Vice-President Mohammad Ali Abtahi told reporters Ms. Kazemi had been murdered. By then, Mr. Khatami had called for an independent judicial investigation. Veteran Judge Javad Esmaeili was appointed by the head of hardline judiciary Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi to direct the probe.

Ms. Kazemi's death was condemned inside and outside Iran. Canada threatened sanctions, and withdrew its ambassador after Kazemi was buried in her birthplace, the southern Iranian city of Shiraz, against the wishes of Canadian authorities and her son, who lives in Montreal.

Tuesday, government spokesman Abdollah Ramezanzadeh said that the Iranian government had no duty to inform Canada of the results of its investigation into Kazemi's death. In Canada later Tuesday, France Bureau, spokeswoman for Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham, responded that Graham expects Iran to keep Canada informed.

Mr. Graham has said what Canada wants in the Ms. Kazemi case is an "understanding why she died, how she died and who will be held responsible."

Ms. Kazemi's son Stephan Hachemi told a news conference Tuesday in Montreal that high-ranking Canadian Embassy officials will meet soon with Mortazavi. He said they're going to ask him among other things to return the body of his mother to Canada.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_1989.shtml

UN inspectors found two types of enriched nuclear material in Iran

AFP - World News (via Yahoo)
Aug 27, 2003

VIENNA - A confidential UN report says inspectors found two different types of highly enriched nuclear particles at facilities in Iran that are not needed in civilian atomic programmes, a Western diplomat said.

"The discovery of enriched uranium is particularly worrying. IAEA inspectors found two different types of highly enriched particles. You do not need that to make nuclear power," the diplomat told AFP.

The findings are contained in a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that was handed to the UN nuclear watchdog's board of governors here Tuesday ahead of a crucial meeting on Iran.

The diplomat said the report poses questions that "all speak to the purpose of Iran's nuclear programme" and shows "a pattern of non-compliance" with the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

It includes revelations that Iran "has admitted that it tried to import centrifuge material" and that it started a heavy water programme in the 1980s.

Heavy water is used for reactors that produce plutonium, a material which can be used to make nuclear weapons.

Tehran insists that its nuclear programme is intended purely to help meet its energy needs but the United States charges that it is secretly trying to develop nuclear arms.

IAEA Secretary General Mohamed ElBaradei this week confirmed that enriched uranium was found at Natanz, 180 miles (290 kilometres) south of Tehran, where Iran is building a uranium processing plant.

Diplomats said this week that the report, which ElBaradei will formally present to the board of governors when they start meeting here on September 8, gives no clear verdict on the nature of Tehran's nuclear programme.

But one told AFP "there will clearly be some sort of resolution on Iran from the board", which can refer the matter to the UN Security Council.

In June, an initial IAEA report found that Tehran had not fully respected the Non-Proliferation Treaty by failing to inform the IAEA of some of its nuclear activities, including importing uranium in 1991.

In Tehran the Iranian permanent representative to the IAEA said on television the new report on nuclear activities in Iran was much softer in tone than its predecessor.

"The report was much less severe than the previous one," said Ali Salehi: "Nowhere is there any mention of negligence or omissions by Iran."

As to the samples indicating enriched uranium, the official said these "must still be submitted to laboratory examination and the IAEA will have to take into consideration Iran's explanation that the samples were contaminated while abroad."

Salehi said Iran had submitted a letter to the IAEA on Monday saying it was willing to pursue talks on remaining problems.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_1985.shtml

U.S. presses Russia to halt nuclear aid to Iran

Reuters - World News
Aug 27, 2003

WASHINGTON - The United States on Wednesday put fresh public pressure on Russia to halt nuclear cooperation with Iran after U.N. inspectors issued a new report faulting Tehran's program.

"Until Iran satisfies the IAEA's questions and fully addresses the concerns of the international community ... we believe that no country should be engaging with Iran in nuclear cooperation, and that would include Russia," State Department deputy spokesman Phillip Reeker told reporters.

He was reacting to an announcement from the Russian Atomic Energy Ministry that Russia and Iran in September would sign an agreement requiring Tehran to return nuclear waste to Moscow.

Nothing Reeker said suggested that Undersecretary of State John Bolton made headway in resolving U.S.-Russian differences over Iran's nuclear program during talks in Moscow on Tuesday.

Russia has pressed ahead with plans to build a nuclear plant at the southern port of Bushehr in Iran despite criticism from Washington which accuses Tehran of seeking to develop nuclear weapons under the cover of a civilian program.

Once the new Russia-Iran agreement is signed, Russia would ship fuel to Iran for the Bushehr reactor which will process it to generate power and send all spent nuclear material -- which can be converted into weapons grade material -- back to Russia.

Two senior U.S. officials have told Reuters the Russians have told Washington they would not provide Iran with the fuel for Bushehr until next spring.

In a confidential report obtained by Reuters on Tuesday, the U.N. nuclear watchdog -- the International Atomic Energy Agency -- confirmed it had found particles of highly-enriched uranium -- weapons grade -- in environmental samples taken at a nuclear facility at Natanz.

The finding may buttress U.S. claims about Iran's nuclear weapons ambitions.

The IAEA is expected to take up the Iran issue at its September 8 board meeting when the Bush administration is looking to pass a resolution finding Tehran in non-compliance with international nuclear safeguards and transfer the issue to the U.N. Security Council for further action.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=3347087

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