Washington, Dec 12 (DPA) US President George W. Bush said Iran must explain the nature of a secret nuclear weapons programme alleged in a US intelligence report and warned the Islamic state will become increasingly dangerous if it continues to enrich uranium.
“We believe Iran had a secret military weapons programme. And Iran must explain to the world why they had a programme,” Bush said during a meeting with Italian President Giorgio Napolitano Tuesday.
The US report, known as a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) and released Dec 3, said Iran had a nuclear weapons programme that was halted in the fall of 2003.
“Iran has an obligation to explain to the IAEA why they hid this program from them,” Bush said.
The NIE was a blow to Bush’s assertions that Iran was actively seeking nuclear weapons, but the president has vowed to forge ahead with more international sanctions on Iran because it continues to enrich uranium in defiance of the UN Security Council.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has announced plans to expand the scope of uranium enrichment, a process that when produced in high concentrations could serve as the material for a nuclear weapon. Ahmadinejad maintains, however, the programme is purely for meeting civilian energy needs.
The NIE said Iran could produce enough enriched uranium to build a bomb sometime in the next decade.
Bush has said that even though the NIE concluded Iran’s nuclear ambitions were not as determined as previously believed, it would not change his policy toward the Islamic state.
The five permanent members of the Security Council – Britain, China, France, Russia and the US – plus Germany, held a conference call Tuesday to discuss a third council resolution containing more sanctions. China and Russia had been reluctant to back a new resolution, a position that was expected to harden because of the NIE report.
US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the countries were reviewing new language in the document but was confident the Security Council could vote on it in the coming weeks.
“We’re not talking about whether or not there’s going to be a resolution, but we’re talking about what are the elements to a new Security Council resolution,” McCormack said.
Meanwhile, a prominent Iranian dissident Tuesday cast doubt on the NIE’s finding that Iran had likely not resumed its nuclear weapons programme as of mid-2007. Instead, Alireza Jafarzadeh told reporters, the Iranian government dismantled the main facility for its nuclear weapons and spread the activities to multiple locations to avoid detection by IAEA inspectors.
After shutting the facility in 2003, Iran resumed the atomic weapons programme in 2004 under the guidance of the more secretive Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, an elite branch of the military, he alleged.
Jafarzadeh, formerly a spokesman for the National Council of Resistance of Iran, revealed in 2002 through sources in Iran the existence of secret nuclear facilities at Natanz and Arak, resulting in IAEA inspections.
The US State Department has since classified The National Council of Resistance of Iran a terrorist organisation.
Jafarzadeh said following the NIE release he checked with his sources to reconfirm conclusions that the Iranian government spread out its nuclear weapons activities.
“These are the facts we are getting on the ground,” Jafarzadeh told reporters at a press conference in Washington.
A spokesman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees the 16 US spy agencies, said it stands by the NIE’s findings and could not say whether Jafarzadeh’s claims will be taken into account.
“We stand by the product we produced,” the spokesman, Ross Feinstein, said.