Israel Matzav

Iran to halt voluntary cooperation with the IAEA

This should not come as too great a surprise to anyone. Now that his good friend Mohammed ElBaradei is not going to chair the IAEA anymore, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Iran has announced that it is halting all voluntary cooperation with the nuclear watchdog (Hat Tip: Jihad Watch).

Iran officially announced that it will cease its voluntary cooperation with the IAEA after the agency’s Board of Governors adopted a resolution against Iran on Friday under pressure by Western countries.

Iran said the drafters of the anti-Iran resolution made a historic mistake and advised the West to discard its policy of confrontation with Tehran.

“To show its goodwill, the Islamic Republic of Iran has so far taken steps beyond its commitments, but this resolution will cause Iran to cooperate with the agency only within the framework of the NPT (nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty),” Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, said on Friday.

“The Board of Governors’ resolution will disrupt the current atmosphere of cooperation and will cause Iran to discontinue its voluntary cooperation which went beyond its commitments,” Soltanieh told the Mehr News Agency.

One other little curiosity from Friday's IAEA vote: The third largest recipient of US foreign aid abstained.

Malaysia, which is the current president of the IAEA Board, Venezuela, and Cuba voted against the resolution, and Afghanistan, Brazil, Egypt, Pakistan, South Africa and Turkey abstained. Azerbaijan Republic missed the vote.

Someone please remind me again why the US gives Egypt, which has one of the bigger interests in not seeing Iran go nuclear, $2 billion in foreign aid every year.

But wait, it gets worse:

The Egyptian ambassador to the IAEA said there is no justification for the resolution since it will damage the quality of Iran’s cooperation with the UN body.

Which 'cooperation' did he have in mind?

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:45 AM