TEHRAN: Senior UN inspectors arrived in Iran on Monday to push for transparency about its disputed nuclear programme, a day after Tehran responded defiantly to tightened EU sanctions by halting oil sales to British and French companies.
Iran denies Western allegations that it is covertly seeking the means to build nuclear weapons and has again vowed no nuclear retreat in recent weeks, but also voiced willingness to resume negotiations with world powers without preconditions.
The five-member team from the International Atomic Energy Agency, led by its global inspectorate chief Herman Nackaerts, planned two days of meetings in another effort to extract answers from Iran regarding intelligence suggesting its declared civilian nuclear programme is a facade for developing bombs.
But Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi dampened speculation about such visits when he told the student news agency ISNA that the IAEA officials would not be going to any nuclear sites. ‘No. Their work has just begun,’ Salehi said.
The spiking tension has put upward pressure on oil prices.
On Sunday, Iran’s oil ministry announced that it had stopped selling oil to French and British companies, although the move will be largely symbolic as those firms had already greatly reduced purchases of Iranian crude.
Deputy Oil Minister Ahmad Qalebani suggested the Western crackdown would backfire, saying that in targeting Iranian oil the West had achieved only a surge in crude prices from $103 a barrel to 120 dollar, ‘and it will soon reach 150 dollar’.
The European Commission says the EU would not be short of oil if Iran stopped crude exports as it has enough stock to meet the bloc’s needs for around 120 days.
Industry sources said European oil buyers were already making big cuts in purchases from Iran months in advance of EU sanctions taking full effect. (Reuters)
