Agence France Presse – The main exiled Iranian opposition group called Thursday for the United Nations to impose all-out sanctions on Tehran, claiming the regime was 18 months from the ability to build a nuclear bomb.
"It is not too late. The international community can still stop the process" through sanctions, Mohammad Mohaddessin, head of foreign affairs for the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), told reporters in Paris.
"The Iranian Resistance calls on the Security Council to swiftly impose comprehensive sanctions against the Iranian regime," he said, a day before the UN deadline for Iran to suspend sensitive nuclear work expires.
Mohaddessin repeated claims by the NCRI — which has in the past provided accurate information on Iran’s nuclear work — that "the regime is currently producing or procuring the necessary components to build a nuclear bomb".
If nothing is done to stop it, "by the end of 2007, the Iranian regime will be in a position to build a nuclear bomb," he charged.
Western powers, led by the United States, are convinced Iran is trying to acquire either a nuclear bomb or the capacity to make one, although Iran insists its nuclear programme is intended only to produce electricity.
Based on information from "supporters in Iranian society", Mohaddessin claimed Tehran was seeking to build a bomb similar to Fat Man, the atomic bomb the United States dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, ending World War II.
Repeating a claim made by the NCRI’s Scandinavian branch last year, he said Tehran had obtained 20 kilos (44 pounds) of beryllium, a metal that can be used to make the trigger for nuclear weapons, from China in the past two years.
Mohaddessin also charged that Iran was currently smuggling high-resistance maraging steel, which can be used to build the outer casing of a nuclear bomb, from Malaysia via the United Arab Emirates.
The UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), is to release a report Friday on Iran’s compliance with UN demands that it freeze sensitive uranium enrichment work.
Iran’s refusal to halt enrichment opens the door to sanctions despite opposition from Russia and China. The United States has also not ruled out taking military action.
The NCRI is opposed to military intervention in Iran, but supports "regime change and the establishment of democracy in Iran," Mohaddessin stressed.
He also repeated calls for the European Union and the United States to remove the NCRI’s military arm — the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI) — from their lists of terrorist organisations.
